BENGALURU: Floodsand landslides have killed more than 270 people in India this month, displacedone million and inundated thousands of homes across six states, authoritiessaid on Wednesday after two weeks of heavy monsoon rains. The rains from Juneto September are a lifeline for rural India, delivering some 70% of thecountry's rainfall, but they also cause death and destruction each year.
The southernstates of Kerala and Karnataka, and Maharashtra and Gujarat in the west, wereamong the hardest hit by floods that washed away thousands of hectares ofsummer-sown crops and damaged roads and rail lines. At least 95 people werekilled and more than 50 are missing in Kerala, where heavy rainfall triggereddozens of landslides last week and trapped more than 100 people.
About 190,000people are still living in relief camps in the state, said Chief MinisterPinarayi Vijayan, but he added some people are returning home as flood watersrecede. In neighboring Karnataka, home to the technology hub Bengaluru, 54people died and 15 are missing after rivers burst their banks when authoritiesreleased water from dams. Nearly 700,000 people have been evacuated in thestate. Heavy rainfall is expected in parts of Karnataka, Maharashtra andGujarat, as well as the central state of Madhya Pradesh, in the next two days,weather officials said.
In Maharashtra,which includes the financial capital Mumbai, 48 people died but flood watersare receding, said a state official. "We are now trying to restoreelectricity and drinking water supplies," he said. In Madhya Pradesh, thebiggest producer of soybeans, heavy rains killed 32 people and damaged crops,authorities said. In Gujarat, 31 people died in rain-related incidents, whilelandslides killed nearly a dozen people in the northern hilly state ofUttarakhand. - Reuters