Thousands without food, water in Kerala; toll hits 370
THRISSUR: Rescuers searched submerged villages in southwest India on Sunday in a desperate hunt for survivors after floods killed at least 370 people and drove more than 700,000 from their homes.
Entire villages in Kerala have been swept away in the state’s worst floods for a century. Rescuers fear the death toll will rise as they reach areas almost entirely under water.
Thousands remain trapped — often without food or water — in towns and villages cut off by the floods, and heavy rain forecast in coming days threatens to compound the disaster.
Nearly 725,000 people have taken shelter in relief camps, state government spokesman Subhash T.V. said on Sunday.
Bedraggled survivors massing at evacuation centres have described desperate scenes after days without food or water.
“They were the scariest hours of our life,” 20-year-old Inderjeet Kumar said at a church doubling as a relief shelter in the hard-hit Thrissur district. “There was no power, no food and no water — even though it was all around us.”
The overall death toll in the state since the start of the monsoon on May 29 had reached 370, the spokesman said. Forty-six of them were found dead in just the last 24 hours.