Dhaka, Bangladesh (CU)_ According to latest reports, eight more people have lost their lives due to heavy flooding and landslides in India’s northeastern state of Assam, bringing the death count to 62 as a result of weeks-long severe rains that forced one of Asia’s largest rivers to overflow. On a roughly 800-kilometer distance through Assam, the Brahmaputra flows from Tibet in China to India and into Bangladesh.
According to Assam’s disaster management agency, over 3 million people were evacuated as the swelling Brahmaputra River overflowed its banks and inundated 32 of the state’s 35 districts. Rescue attempts required the participation of the Indian army, while the air force stood on standby. On Sunday, after a boat carrying nine individuals overturned in the Dibrugarh region of eastern Assam, which is 500 kilometers east of the state capital of Gauhati, four people went missing. According to the police, strong currents are hindering continuing search activities.
Forecasters anticipate a break in the weather after days of nonstop rainfall. According to Sanjay O’Neil, an employee at the meteorological station in Gauhati, the capital of Assam, the volume of rainfall was unusual. Assam’s chief minister, Himanta Biswa Sarma, paid a visit to the flood-affected areas on Saturday and described the situation as dire. According to Sarma, the army and other rescue organizations had already evacuated over 20,000 people. He said, “We are currently focused on relief and rescue efforts”.
The region gets its annual monsoon rainfall from June through September. These rains are essential for seasonally planted crops, but they can inflict considerable damage. Flooding from overflowing rivers has now spread to Bangladesh, where the administration has warned that the situation would likely worsen in the worst-affected Sunamganj and Sylhet districts in the northeast and north.
Since Friday, lightning strikes have caused at least nine deaths in Bangladesh. A pre-monsoon flash flood, caused by an influx of water from upstream in India’s northeastern provinces, struck the northern and northeastern areas of Bangladesh last month, destroying crops and causing damage to houses and highways. This week, further rains swamped the same regions of the country, which had just begun to recover.
