Floods threaten 2M Indians

Press, 2 August 1983, Page 10

Floods threaten 2M Indians

NZPA New Delhi A second wave of floods in India had killed at least 43 people and affected more than 2 million, and made tens of thousands homeless, Federal flood control officials said yesterday. The eastern states of Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Orissa, and Assam in the

north-east were the latest to be affected. All main rivers in the states were rising, posing serious threats to another 2 million people in the Ganges Plains, officials said. More than 1000 peoplle were reported dead or missing in the first wave of floods that devastated large

> areas in the west coastal state of Gujarat. 1 “Heavy monsoon rain has fed all the major rivers in the central Indian plains and any further rain might play havoc,” an official co- ‘ ordinating flood relief work said. . Annual silting of river-

beds and the near absence of flood protection measures in the area had exposed the states on the Ganges Plains to flood havoc every year, the official said. The river Gandek, in Bihar state, has burst its banks at two places, inundating large areas.