At least 14 people have died and more than 30 are missing after a massive landslide at a railway construction site in a remote area of eastern India.
Key points:
- Seven of the confirmed dead were members of the Territorial Army
- Continuous rainfall over the past three weeks has wreaked havoc across India and Bangladesh
- An estimated 200 people have been killed in heavy downpours and mudslides since May 17
Disaster response workers, police and local villagers were trying to rescue those buried under the debris in Noney, a town near Imphal, the capital of Manipur state.
Seven of the confirmed dead were members of the Territorial Army, Manipur Chief Minister Nongthombam Biren Singh said.
He said five Indian Railway officials were among those feared missing.
A railway project is being constructed in the area, where there is a rebel insurgency, and the army personnel were providing security for railway officials overseeing the project.
The state’s decades-old insurgency seeks a separate homeland for ethnic and tribal groups.
Continuous rainfall over the past three weeks has wreaked havoc across India’s north-east, which has eight states and 45 million people, and in neighbouring Bangladesh.
An estimated 200 people have been killed in heavy downpours and mudslides in states including Assam, Manipur, Tripura and Sikkim, while 42 people have died in Bangladesh since May 17.
Hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced.
Scientists say climate change is a factor behind the erratic, early rains that triggered the floods.
Monsoon rains in South Asia typically begin in June, but torrential rain lashed north-eastern India and Bangladesh as early as March this year.
With rising global temperatures due to climate change, experts say the monsoon season is becoming more variable, meaning that much of the rain that would typically fall throughout the season arrives in a shorter period.
AP
