Authorities in India on Thursday conducted mass cremations of hundreds of people who were killed by devastating floods and landslides that struck Uttarakhand nearly two weeks ago.
Army helicopters flew Hindu priests to the worst-hit town of Kedarnath in Uttarakhand to conduct funeral prayers before the cremations of nearly 300 bodies that were found buried in silt near the town’s main temple.
State government spokesman Amit Chandola said that authorities had airlifted tons of logs for the cremations, but that the funerals were delayed by intermittent rain. Eighteen bodies were cremated Wednesday before the rain, he said.
With the skies clearing up Thursday, the cremations resumed.
Before being cremated, each body was photographed and DNA samples were collected, Chandola said.
Kedarnath, one of four temple towns in Uttarakhand, is part of a popular Hindu pilgrimage route. Most devout Hindus make the pilgrimage at least once in their lives, and hundreds of thousands of people visit the temples during the summer before the onset of the monsoon season. This year, however, they were caught in early rains in mid-June that led to torrential floods and landslides in the Himalayan region.
India steps up grim search for bodies in flood zone
Rescue workers stepped up the search for bodies Thursday in India’s flood-ravaged north and mass cremations took place as fears grew over outbreaks of disease, officials and reports said.
More than 100,000 mainly pilgrims and tourists have been evacuated from the disaster zone while some 4,000 remain in relief camps after the flash floods and landslides that hit the state of Uttarakhand on June 15.
Rivers swollen by monsoon rains have swept away houses, buildings and entire villages in the Himalayan state, which was packed with tourists and pilgrims travelling to Hindu shrines.
Around 1,000 people have died, the state government has told AFP, although officials have warned the death toll could rise as more victims are found.
Persistent bad weather is hampering evacuations from the relief camps, officials said, and their focus is increasingly on recovering bodies to prevent the spread of disease.
“The remaining people will be evacuated as and when the weather clears,” a senior officer overseeing rescue operations told AFP.
“The bigger worry is finding the scores of dead bodies that may be still buried under debris,” said the officer, who did not want to be named as he is not authorised to speak to the media.
Health officials have warned locals against drinking river water on concerns of contamination from rotting bodies.
Six bodies were found floating in the Ganges in Allahabad on Wednesday, some 650 kilometres (404 miles) downstream from Kedarnath, according to reports, highlighting the difficulty of locating all those who perished.
Rescue workers are clearing away large amounts of debris and scouring remote areas for victims. More than 1,000 bridges have been damaged along with roads, cutting off villages and towns.
A team of police, doctors and firemen has been deployed to the worst-hit Hindu temple area of Kedarnath Valley to recover bodies there, the officer said from the state capital Dehradun.
All survivors in that area have already been picked up. “They are carrying saws, plate-cutters and also saline water which is needed to preserve body parts,” the officer said.
The team includes mountaineers to retrieve bodies found in the jungle, valleys and gorges, and help carry them out on foot, as well as photographers who will send pictures to the police to speed up the identification process.
DNA samples from the bodies are being taken before cremation and are being preserved by the authorities, officials said.
The search for bodies and the cremations came as villagers accused authorities of ignoring the needs of local residents and instead focusing rescue and relief efforts on visiting pilgrims and tourists. “There were 67 houses in our Chandrapuri village out of which 63 were washed away by the Mandikini river,” Birendra Singh, a former army officer, told AFP at a relief camp in Dehradun.
Friday 28 June 2013
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2013%5C06%5C28%5Cstory_28-6-2013_pg14_4
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