Amit Shah holds meeting to review preparations to deal with Cyclone Nisarga

New Delhi, June 01: Home Minister Amit Shah on Monday held a meeting to review preparations for dealing with Cyclone Nisarga brewing over the Arabian Sea that is expected to hit parts of Maharashtra and Gujarat on June 3.

Senior officials of concerned agencies NDMA, NDRF, IMD and the Indian Coast Guard attended the meeting with the home minister, according to a statement released by the Home Minister's Office (HMO).

The depression in the Arabian Sea is likely to intensify into a severe cyclone and cross north Maharashtra and south Gujarat coasts on June 3, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) has said.

The Met department has predicted very heavy to extremely heavy rainfall in parts of Maharashtra and Gujarat on June 3 and June 4.

Cyclone Nisarga is likely to make landfall over Palghar district, around 100 km north of Mumbai by Wednesday evening or at night.

The National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) on Monday deployed nine teams in Maharashtra. Of these, three are on standby in Mumbai, two in Palghar, one each in Thane, Raigad, Ratnagiri and Sindhudurg

In Gujarat, the NDRF has deployed 11 teams besides one team each in Daman&Diu and Dadra&Nagar Haveli.

The cyclonic storm called Nisarga follows super cyclonic storm Amphan that ravaged the West Bengal-Bangladesh coast this month on May 20. According to weather.com, the name Nisarga is suggested by Bangladesh.

It will be the first to be used from a new list of names for cyclones for North Indian Ocean cyclones released in 2020.