Deccan Chronicle

Indian origin shares Pulitzer

- NAYEAR AZAD | DC PATNA, APRIL 22

New York: An Indian-origin software engineer in the US has shared this year’s Pulitzer Prize for a project in investigat­ive journalism and the growing use of IT tools in reporting. Palani Kumanan, a software architect was part of the Wall Street Journal’s winning project ‘Medicare Unmasked’. —

A powerful cyclonic storm battered Bihar’s Seemanchal area on Tuesday night, killing 42 and injuring more than 80 persons, rendering thousands homeless and cutting off the communicat­ion network entirely.

The meteorolog­ical department said that the storm of up to 65 kms per hour entered from Nepal and created havoc in Purnia and other Seemanchal area districts.

A victim who lost relative and his house in the storm said, “We had not expected that in a single stroke all my life will change for worse”.

According to the data available with this newspaper, apart from Purnia where 32 persons died due to this storm, seven persons were killed in Madhepura and one each in Madhubani, Darbhanga and Supaul. The administra­tive officials in Purnia said that most of the devastatio­n occurred in the urban area of the district. There are reports that 19 persons were killed in Dagarua block which is around eight kilometers from Purnia town.

Following this devastatin­g storm the state government on Wednesday announced `4 lakh each as compensati­on to the kin of those who died. Pappu Yadav, MP from Madhepura too has announced a compensati­on of `50,000 each for family members of the victims.

Indian Meteorolog­ical Department director in Patna R. K. Giri said the Nor’wester, or tropical storm, which descended from Nepal hitting Purnia, Sitamarhi, Darbhanga and went deep inside the state up to Bhagalpur, packed a wind speed around 65 km per hour.

 ?? PTI ?? An uprooted tree in Purnia on Wednesday —
PTI An uprooted tree in Purnia on Wednesday —

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