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Issued: 0845 Wednesday 6th September 2006
Duty forecaster: Simon Keeling
Three more killed as troops ferry in aid in flood-hit Kashmir
SRINAGAR, India, Sept 5, 2006 (AFP) - The death toll from the heaviest rains in 25 years in Indian Kashmir rose by three to 16 on Tuesday as troops rushed supplies to people cut off by floods, police said.
Two women died late Monday in landslides and house collapses in the southern district of Poonch and northern district of Baramulla, a police spokesman said.
A man died when a ferry overturned Tuesday in fast-moving waters in Baramulla, taking the death toll since Saturday from the lashing monsoon rains to 16. Most of the victims were women and children.
"The army and police have been helping the administration in this hour of crisis. They've been distributing aid to the needy," said the region's flood control minister Dilawar Mir.
"We've launched relief and rescue in all the affected areas," he said, adding that the government was setting up community kitchens to feed people forced from their homes.
Some 15,000 people living in over 160 villages, towns and cities have been affected by the flooding, officials say. The flooding forced the shutdown of schools across the state. Boats ferried army and police personnel through muddy, gushing waters to deliver food and blankets to people affected.
The soldiers aiding in the rescue efforts are stationed in the state to help battle a 17-year-old Islamic separatist insurgency.
Over 90,000 hectares (222,000 acres) of paddy fields were submerged by the overflowing rivers, officials said.
"We are finished. We are ruined," said farmer Ismail Ahmed, 72, as he surveyed his paddy field covered in muddy water on the outskirts of the Indian Kashmir summer capital of Srinagar.
"Our house is already flooded and now are fields are flooded too," he said.
Kashmir's key highways remained shut for a fifth straight day and 300 houses and 100 stores had caved in over the past few days, officials said. Most of the inhabitants had already abandoned the structures fearing they would collapse.
Kashmir's weather department chief L.C. Ram said the rains were the worst in a quarter of a century in the state of 10 million people.
Rivers swelled above danger levels, submerging low-lying areas in southern Pulwama and Anantnag districts, and also parts of Srinagar.
Over the past few days, thousands of people in Srinagar abandoned their ground floors after floodwaters rushed in, forcing them to move to upper storeys or even abandon their houses altogether.