Cyclone Vayu no more a threat, evacuees can return: Gujarat CM Rupani

Ahmedabad: Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani on Friday said cyclonic storm Vayu no longer posed any threat to the state as it had moved away westward. Following a meeting with top officials in Gandhinagar, Rupani asked the authorities to let around 2.75 lakh people who had been shifted to safety to return to their homes.

"Gujarat is now completely safe. There exists no threat from cyclone Vayu now as the storm has veered towards the west in the Arabian Sea. "Around 2.75 lakh people who were evacuated from the coastal areas are free to return to their homes," the chief minister told reporters.

The state government will pay an allowance totalling around Rs 5.5 crore to the evacuees for daily expenses over the next three days, he announced. As per the latest weather report by the Meteorological Centre here, the cyclone is "moving slowly away from the coast" and currently located in the Arabian Sea, around 150 km from Porbandar.

"Schools and colleges will start as per their schedules tomorrow. We are also calling back senior officials and ministers who were deployed in ten coastal districts to supervise relief and rescue operations. Road transport buses have started plying in these areas today," Rupani said.

Teams of National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) will remain stationed along the coastline for another 48 hours, he said. It was predicted earlier that the cyclone would make landfall on Gujarat coast Thursday afternoon, leading the government to prepare for possible damage.

It also brought moderate-to-heavy rains to 114 tehsils of Gujarat, mostly along the coast. The highest rainfall of 6. 5 inches (160mm) was recorded in Talala tehsil of Gir-Somnath district since Thursday, said the Met department release.