Taking a lesson from incidents on Beas river in Himachal Pradesh and Damodar river in Jharkhand, the Chhattisgarh government has directed the administration to alert people and give them time to move to safe places before opening the floodgates of dams across the state.

In an advisory, Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Raman Singh has directed district authorities not to open the gates of dams without issuing prior alert.

He ordered that officials should ensure that sufficient time was given to people in low lying areas to shift to safe places before releasing water from reservoirs.

The CM strictly instructed collectors to keep a close vigil on rising water level in rivers, canals and dams during the monsoon through the water resources department.

Singh has instructed that people in low lying areas and officers of the neighbouring state should be informed 12 hours in advance, if water has to be released from a dam.

During this period, gates should not be suddenly opened, he has directed. In case of any emergency, some arrangements should be made to inform people at the earliest so that they can move to safe places, the official said, quoting the CM.

The directives have been issued following the incident in Himachal Pradesh where 24 engineering students from Andhra Pradesh were washed away in the Beas river after authorities opened the floodgates of a dam for a power project.

Similarly, in Jharkhand, 10 boys had a miraculous escape after they were trapped in the Damodar river after floodgates of Tenughat dam were opened. The boys took shelter on a concrete platform and were rescued after nearly eight hours.