26 more dead in India monsoon fury, waters recede in Bangladesh

GUWAHATI, India: At least 26 more people have died in monsoon flooding and lightning strikes in India, as millions remained marooned in the country and neighbouring Bangladesh, authorities said on Monday.

Floods are a regular menace in India and Bangladesh, but experts say climate change is increasing their frequency, ferocity and unpredictability for the two countries’ 1.6 billion people.

In India’s northeastern state of Assam, three people were killed in landslides while six others died in flood waters, disaster management authorities said. In the eastern state of Bihar, lightning triggered by storms killed at least 17 people, according to local disaster management minister Renu Devi.

Assam continued to reel under severe flooding, with 5,140 villages across the state’s 33 districts submerged by surging waters. More than 100,000 villagers are taking refuge in relief shelters.

The state was first hit in April when pre-monsoon rains arrived, causing floods that killed 44 people. The floodwaters receded after a few weeks, only to rise again in June at the start of the annual monsoon season and taking the state toll to 71 so far.

In neighbouring Meghalaya state, at least 16 people have been killed since last Thursday after landslides and surging rivers that submerged roads. Monsoon storms have also unleashed devastating floods in Bangladesh that have left millions stranded and killed dozens so far.

On Monday, flood water was gradually receding from the northeastern district of Sylhet, though millions are still marooned, said Mosharraf Hossain, the chief administrator of the district.

"The relief shelters are full of affected people. There’s a huge crisis of food and drinking water. Many are scared to return home while many lost their houses in floodwater," he told AFP. But the receding water is flooding districts further downstream in Habiganj and Brahmanbaria, officials said.

In Jamalpur district, an eight-year-old girl was swept away by strong currents from her inundated backyard and later found dead, police officer Aminul Islam said. Heavy rainfall also continued in the southeastern Chittagong Hills districts leading to waterlogging in the port city and exacerbating risks of landslides.

Authorities in flood-hit Bangladesh and northeastern India scrambled on Monday to provide aid to more than nine million people marooned after the heaviest rains in years killed at least 54 people across both South Asian nations, officials said.

Monsoon rains in low-lying Bangladesh have triggered catastrophic flooding in the northeastern Sylhet administrative division, leaving a quarter of its 15 million population stranded amid fast-rising waters and swollen rivers.

"The flooding is the worst in 122 years in the Sylhet region," said Atiqul Haque, director general of Bangladesh's department of disaster management. The situation in Sylhet has been worsened by waters cascading down from the surrounding hills of India's Meghalaya state, including some of world's wettest areas like Mawsynram and Cherrapunji that each received more than 970 mm of rain on Sunday, according to government data.

Around 300,000 people have been moved to shelters in Sylhet but more than four million people are stranded near their inundated homes, compounding the challenges for authorities to provide aid, including drinking water and medical supplies.

"The situation is still alarming," Mohammad Mosharraf Hossain, Sylhet division's chief administrator, told Reuters by phone. "We are intensifying our efforts providing relief materials. At the moment, the main challenge is to reach everyone and ensuring availability of drinking water."