AHMEDABAD (India) • Floods and relentless rain in India's western state of Gujarat have killed at least 75 people and displaced over 25,000 over the past three weeks, officials said yesterday.

This year's monsoon rains have lashed western and eastern India, leaving several states fighting to contain the flood fury that has affected thousands of people.

The situation remains critical in Gujarat, prompting Prime Minister Narendra Modi to take an aerial survey of his home state on Tuesday to assess the damage.

Mr Mayank Rawal, a senior official in the disaster management department in Ahmedabad, Gujarat's main city, said more than 10,000 people have been moved to higher ground. Air force helicopters were carrying out sorties to drop food packets to those stranded.

Mr L. B. Bambhaniya, administrator of flood-ravaged Banaskantha district in Gujarat, said 350 villages have been waterlogged, affecting cotton and groundnut crops. "We will have to provide financial support to farmers," he added.

In neighbouring Rajasthan, a usually arid state, six people were killed in three flood-hit districts.

In the eastern state of West Bengal, more than 25,000 people were forced from their homes due to the rains and sudden discharge of water from several dams in neighbouring Jharkhand.

REUTERS