Eight killed, many injured; large damage in weather fury in Tripura, Mizoram

Agartala/Aizawl: Seasonal cyclonic storms accompanied by lightning and rain continued to create devastation in Tripura and Mizoram for the sixth day Friday, killing eight people so far injuring 40 others, an official said here.

Several thousand houses have been damaged in the cyclonic storms accompanied by lightning and incessant rains that also uprooted thousands of trees, telephone and electric poles both in Tripura and Mizoram. Restoration work was on in both the northeastern states. "Since Sunday, eight people, including five women, were killed in different parts of Tripura in house collapse and lightning. Over 40 people injured some of them seriously in these weather furies," an official of the Tripura relief department told a news agency. "Sixty-year-old Ramani Debbarma and her 17-year-old-son Utpal died when huge landslides buried their home at Simna in western Tripura Wednesday night. Their bodies have been recovered late Thursday night," he added. The first nonstop rains in the pre-monsoon period also caused flooding and huge waterlogging in the low-lying areas of capital Agartala, its outskirts and other parts of Tripura. Several thousand people were forced to move to several makeshift relief camps. The Tripura government has sanctioned from Rs 1,000 to Rs 10,000 as immediate relief assistance to each affected family. An official of the Airport Authority of India said the bad weather hit flights on the Agartala-Kolkata-Guwahati-Delhi routes. In Mizoram, a large number of villages have become inaccessible after landslides triggered by heavy and incessant rains that have been lashing the state since Saturday have blocked the highways. "The landslides also blocked the Champai road (in Saiha district in southern Mizoram) connecting the Aizawl city with the Mizoram-Myanmar border," a Mizoram relief and rehabilitation department official said. According to the official, Kolasib district in northern Mizoram was the worst hit with more than 150 houses badly damaged and four people seriously injured in the cyclonic storms. Electricity supply was badly disrupted in many areas of the mountainous state. The Met Offices in Agartala and Aizawl Friday predicted more rain and cyclonic storms in the next 48 hours. IANS