Pithoragarh: A woman died and about 30 houses were destroyed in the cloud burst incident in the Lasko river flowing close to the India and Nepal border at midnight in the Pithoragarh district of Uttarakhand. Officials said the incident took place in the Khotila village of Dharchula block of the district.
“About 30 houses have been destroyed in the cloud burst incident and one woman has died,” District Magistrate (DM) Ashish Chauhan said. The cloudburst took place in a border village of Nepal and triggered a flash flood in Khotila village on the Indian side as waters of the swelling Kali river rushed into homes, filling them with sludge and killing the woman.
The body of Pashupati Devi, a resident of Khotila village, was later pulled out of the sludge that had choked her house after the flooding of the river, Pithoragarh District Magistrate Ashish Chauhan said. The cloudburst occurred past midnight in Bangabagar village across the India-Nepal border, Chauhan said. The river waters mixed with debris gushed into 36 homes in Khotila village, officials said.
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The woman killed in the incident did not get the time to unbolt the door of her home and run to safety, the DM said. He said 170 affected people of the village have been evacuated and put up in makeshift shelters built at Dharchula stadium. The affected village on the Nepal side of the border received 132.2 mm of rainDM Chauhan said. The cloudburst has caused casualties on the Nepal side of the border too, the officials said.
Pithoragarh District Disaster Management Officer Bhupendra Singh Mahar said some animals belonging to villagers have also been lost. The Dharchula administration is running relief and rescue operations on the spot with the help of State Disaster Response Force (SDRF) and police personnel, Mahar said. The extent of damage is yet to be assessed, he said.
Several shops and vehicles were also buried under the rubble. The DM said the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) and the State Disaster Response Fund (SDRF) teams are engaged in the relief work on the spot. Earlier on August 20, a similar incident of cloud burst in Dehradun had intense repercussions as reports of heavy water flow damaging various roads came to the fore.
