Jehlum Tawi Flood Recovery Project: World Bank team to visit Kashmir on Oct 22

Srinagar, Oct 16: Principal Secretary, Planning, Development and Monitoring Department Rohit Kansal Tuesday chaired the meeting of officials here to review the progress and implementation of Jhelum and Tawi Flood Recovery Project (JTFRP).
The meeting was attended by CEO Economic Reconstruction Agency (ERA), Dr Raghav Langar, Chief Engineer ERA, Showkat Ahmad Wani, Director Planning and Coordination Jhelum and Tawi Flood Recovery Project (JTFRP) Iftikhar Ahmad Hakeem, Director Technical JTFRP, Khalid Iqbal, Director Disaster Management, Aamir Ali, Joint Director Planning, Sheikh Shavaiz and other concerned officials.
On the occasion, the meeting was informed that the rupees 1500 crore project has been divided into five components. Under its first component, the work is being carried on the construction and strengthening of critical infrastructure at the estimated cost of Rs 216.59 crore. The construction of roads and bridges is being carried out at an estimate cost of Rs 597.80 crore.
The amount of Rs 272.95 crore is being spent on the restoration of urban flood management infrastructure, while as Rs 106.78 crore is being utilized on the restoration and strengthening of livelihoods. Similarly, the amount of Rs 120 crore is being utilized for strengthening of disaster management capacity.
Terming JTFRP as the project of great significance for the State, Kansal asked the officials to work on this project with added enthusiasm and directed them to ensure that all the efforts are made on the implementation of project as expeditiously as possible. For this purpose, he directed the officials to ensure that all the projects be allotted for the execution by November 30.
He also sought the details about the DPRs to be submitted to the World Bank for different projects involving different sectors in education, Roads hospitals and others.
Kansal informed the meeting that the team from the World Bank will be visiting the valley on October 22 to October 26 to take midterm review of the World-Bank-funded JTFRP. The review will be taken to access the progress of the project.
In this regard, he directed the officials to prepare all the necessary documents and presentations to be presented before the World Bank team. He also asked the officials to convene a meeting, before the visit of World Bank team, to discuss all the things that need to be shared with them.
It is pertinent to mention here that in September 2014, the incessant rains caused Jhelum and Chenab Rivers as well as many other streams/tributaries to flow above the danger mark causing the flood in Kashmir, resulting in huge infrastructural damage.
In the aftermath of the devastating floods the Government of India requested assistance from the World Bank and an emergency project figured by the Natural Disaster was started, the Project is named as Jhelum Tawi Flood Recovery Project.
JTFRP will focus on restoring critical infrastructure using international best practice on resilient infrastructure. Given the region’s vulnerability to both floods and earthquakes, the infrastructure will be designed with upgraded resilient features, and will include contingency planning for future disaster events. Therefore, the project aims at both restoring essential services disrupted by the floods and improving the design standard and practices to increase resilience.