Flash floods kill 24 in India

NEW DELHI • Flash floods triggered by torrential rain have killed at least 24 people in India and forced over 170,000 from their homes, officials said yesterday, as forecasters predicted more downpours in the coming days.

Last week saw 35 per cent more rain than the average, the weather office said.

In the central state of Madhya Pradesh, 20 people were killed, and some 70,000 left homeless as water rose to dangerous levels along parts of the Narmada river.

"We are working on a war-footing mode to set up relief camps," additional home secretary Basant Singh said in Bhopal, the state capital, adding that medicine was being distributed to prevent an outbreak of water-borne diseases.

Stormy weather also ravaged parts of the remote North-east, with two killed in the tea-growing state of Assam, while 100,000 were forced to take shelter on higher ground. The rain has also swelled the Brahmaputra river, which flows into Bangladesh, to dangerous levels.

Meanwhile, nine people were killed and 18 are missing after the remains of super typhoon Nepartak swept into China over the weekend, the government said yesterday.

The deaths were all in the south-eastern province of Fujian where the typhoon made landfall, a ministry statement said. Total economic damage has been pegged at 900 million yuan (S$181.5 million), with 16,000ha of crops destroyed and over 900 houses wrecked, the ministry said.

In Taiwan, the storm caused at least three deaths and more than 300 injuries. More than 15,000 people fled their homes as part of the island saw its strongest winds in over a century.

The storm is expected to worsen severe flooding in parts of central and eastern China as it makes its way inland. By late Sunday, more than 200,000 residents in 10 mainland Chinese cities had been temporarily relocated and some 1,900 homes destroyed, Xinhua news agency said.

REUTERS, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE

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A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Straits Times on July 12, 2016, with the headline Flash floods kill 24 in India. Subscribe