Thousands evacuated as cyclone builds off India and Pakistan’s coast
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A man carrying his belongings through a flooded street on Aug 28 after heavy rain on the outskirts of Ahmedabad.
PHOTO: AFP
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AHMEDABAD/ISLAMABAD – Heavy rain battered India and Pakistan’s coastal areas along the Arabian Sea, flooding cities in western India’s Gujarat state and forcing thousands of people from their homes, with the authorities predicting a cyclonic storm to develop by Aug 30.
People waded through waist-high waters that partly submerged vehicles and roads in parts of the state, visuals from Reuters Television showed.
At least 28 people have died this week from rain-related incidents in the state, officials said, as meteorologists in India and neighbouring Pakistan warned that more heavy downpours and strong winds were expected to lash the coast.
“There is no electricity for the last two days,” said Mr Prabhu Ram Soni, who lives in the coastal city of Jamnagar. “I have an eight-month-old daughter and an asthma patient, my mother, who is on oxygen support.”
More than 18,000 have been evacuated since Aug 25 from cities near the coast, the disaster management authorities said.
The army was also involved in relief efforts in the state, which was hit in 2023 by Cyclone Biparjoy, damaging infrastructure and leading to the evacuation of more than 180,000 people.
Heavy rain also lashed Jamnagar, home to the world’s largest oil refinery complex, owned by Reliance, the district collector, Mr B. K. Pandya, told Reuters.
At nearby Vadinar, Nayara Energy, backed by Russian groups including its largest oil producer, Rosneft, runs another refinery.
“They are operational,” Mr Pandya said, when asked if rain had affected work in the refineries, adding that the authorities were focusing on rescue efforts in the district.
A deep depression off Gujarat is expected to intensify into a cyclonic storm by Aug 30, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said, but it was forecast to move away from the Indian coast over the next two days.
In Pakistan, the weather department warned fishermen to not venture into the sea until Aug 30.
The IMD has forecast extremely heavy rainfall in Gujarat’s Bharuch, Kutch and Saurashtra districts on Aug 30.
Rain also triggered flash floods in the neighbouring Pakistani port city of Karachi, causing power outages, media reported.
The Pakistani authorities have also warned of flash floods in two districts of the southern province of Sindh, which is still recovering from the massive floods of 2022 that inundated large swathes of the country and damaged the economy. REUTERS
