Auditor’s report says indiscriminate discharge of water from Chembarambakkam lake burdened the Adyar river

The Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) has been scathing in its criticism of the government’s handling of the Chennai floods of 2015, going so far as to categorise it as a “man- made disaster”. It has held the government of Tamil Nadu responsible for the scale of the catastrophe, which the latter had termed a “natural disaster”.

The CAG report, ‘Flood management and response in Chennai and its suburban areas’, was tabled by the AIADMK government on Monday.

Though the report was submitted to the government in March 2016, it was not tabled, and the opposition had raised the issue in the Assembly during the last budget session.

Tabled in the Assembly during the last day of the session, the report has found fault with the government on many counts, with the Water Resources Department (WRD) drawing the maximum flak.

The report said that there was indiscriminate discharge of water from the Chembarambakkam reservoir, in excess of inflows, which burdened the Adyar river, leading to floods in the city and its suburbs.'