Crocodile, snakes take over Kerala homes
Hospital in Ernakulam district is treating 52 persons for snakebites
People returning to their flood-battered homes in Kerala from relief camps were are being greeted by snakes and other reptiles and insects.
At Chalakudy in Thrissur district, a man who returned on Monday night to check the condition of his house was stunned to see a new occupant — a crocodile.
Taken aback, he and his neighbours quickly caught the crocodile and bound it with ropes.
Thrissur is one of the most affected districts — the others being Alappuzha, Pathanamthitta, Idukki, Kozhikode, Ernakulam, Malappuram and Wayanad — in the worst flooding in the state in nearly a century.
The disaster has killed some 400 people, left over a million people homeless and caused unprecedented destruction to both private and public property.
Mustafa, a snake catcher, is a busy man in Malappuram. Since the waters began to recede in the past two days, he has caught over 100 snakes from homes. A hospital in Angamaly in Ernakulam district is treating 52 persons for snakebites.
The Indian military is scaling down rescue operations in the southern state of Kerala, where intense floods killed more than 200 people and drove hundreds of thousands from their homes.
Decreasing rains and floodwaters means the navy can cut back on its rescue teams in Kerala, navy spokesman Captain D.K. Sharma said in a Monday statement. The navy has rescued a total of nearly 16,000 people in the state.
People have begun leaving Kerala’s thousands of relief camps over the past couple days, heading to their homes to check on damage and begin the long process of cleaning up.
Intense rains, which began on August 8 in Kerala, had decreased substantially by Monday. Meteorologists are expecting light-to-moderate rains in coming days.
While water and electricity have been returned to parts of flood-stricken Kerala, the state’s utilities were working to restore service to vast areas that still had no service, the Press Trust of India news agency reported.
More leave relief camps
Just outside of Kochi, thousands of people have been streaming over the past two days from the grounds of Union Christian College, one of more than 3,000 relief camps created amid the havoc.
A week ago, volunteers at the camp estimated 10,000 people were jammed into the schools’ buildings. Yesterday, there were perhaps 1,500.
Abdullah Aliyar has been living in the camp with four of his relatives. On Monday, he returned briefly to his home, which is a few kilometres away. He was dismayed by what he found: “There was sludge and muck nearly up to my knee.”
But for now the family is remaining at the college. There’s no drinking water at home, and no electricity. He doesn’t know when they’ll be able to return.
Meanwhile, The Cochin Port Trust has earmarked two warehouses for free storage of relief materials, arriving from across the country, for people affected by the unprecedented floods in Kerala, a port trust official said.
The first truck carrying relief materials, mobilised by all major ports under the Union Shipping Ministry, was dispatched through the VOC Port Trust in Tuticorin and will be arriving at the port here today, he said.
Four containers of relief materials sent by the shipping fraternity from Tuticorin under the initiative of the ministry was delivered for distribution yesterday, the official said.
The coastal crude vessel Swarna Godavari, with 50,000 MT of crude from Mumbai, was diverted by BPCL to the Cochin Port to meet the fuel demand of Kerala. It arrived yesterday, he said.
More relief materials from different parts of India have started arriving at the Cochin port through coastal shipping.
Storage of medicines
Naval Ship INS Deepak carrying relief materials from Mumbai had arrived at the Cochin port on Sunday with about 800 tonnes of fresh water and about 18 tonnes of provisions.
This ship will make another call at the port with relief materials tomorrow, the official said.
Incessant rains over the last few days have blurred the distinction between Kerala’s backwaters and roads with sheets of water covering the landscape, but the state is facing shortage of potable water.
The Cochin Port Trust has earmarked two berths for priority berthing of vessels bringing flood relief materials to Kerala.
Two godowns have also been earmarked for storage of relief materials and medicines free of charges, he said.
The official said the Transworld Group has offered special coastal services of ships connecting ports at Hazira, Mundra, Kattupalli, Tuticorin, Pipavav, Kandla with Cochin for carrying flood relief materials from different parts of India.