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Flood fury continues in northern India

by IBNS 18 Aug 2014, 07:35 am

New Delhi, Aug 18 (IBNS): Heavy monsoonal rain triggered flood situation hitting a large part of four north Indian states of Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and West Bengal, reports said.

At least 28 people died only in Uttar Pradesh owing to floods so far with district like Bahraich, Shravasti, Balrampur, Gonda, Lakhimpur, Barabanki, Sitapur and Faizabad being the worst affected ones.

Sources said the situation in Balrampur and Barabanki districts is quite alarming as thousands of people have already left homes in the fear of rising water level in rivers.

The Centre also issued an “unprecedented flood situation” alert for the Rapti that is flowing above the danger level.

While the Rapti is flooding owing to Bhalubang, Bhairahwa and Kusum barrages in Nepal are releasing excess water. River Ghaghara has also swollen due to release of flood waters from the Chisapani barrage in Nepal. 

According to reports, at least two people were killed and around four lakh affected in nine districts of neighbouring Bihar as well due to the flood situation with Darbhanga, Nalanda, West Champaran and Patna being the worst-hit districts.

Nearly 38,000 people have been evacuated so far and 75 relief camps were set up in the affected pockets, sources said.

As many as 12 teams of National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) have been deployed in Bihar and four teams in Uttar Pradesh to carry out the rescue and relief operations. Besides that, three helicopters have been kept on standby to help rescue flood-hit people in Bihar and two helicopters for Uttar Pradesh, officials said.

In West Bengal, Cooch Behar district has been the worst affected as most of the rivers are in spate and Jaldhaka and Gadadhar are flowing much above the danger mark.

At least three people were washed away by strong water currents as rain caused havoc in the Mandi, Kangra and Hamirpur districts of Himachal Pradesh causing landslides and disrupting the traffic movements. So far, the flash floods have claimed 11 lives in the state.

According to the meteorological department, rain fury is expected to continue for another week.

In Uttarakhand, at least 27 people have lost their lives in the last 72 hours. Heavy rains created havoc and triggered landslides, cloudburst and flooding across the state. Seven people were reportedly killed in Dehradun's Rajpur area due to landslides while 20 people were killed in cloudbursts at four places in Uttarakhand’s Pauri district on Friday.

The flood situation in the north-eastern state of Assam turned grim as it claimed the life of a child with flood waters submerging nearly 250 villages in several parts of the state, officials had said on Saturday.

Villages in Lakhimpur, Dhemaji, Dhubri, Nagaon, Sonitpur and Golaghat districts were submerged following incessant rainfall in the state. Brahmaputra and its tributaries water level also crossed danger level in several areas in the state.