World

Floods In South India Leave Millions Homeless

by Sudha Krishna | October 6, 2009 at 02:36 pm

1243 views | 39 Recommendations | 8 comments

About 5 million people are now crammed into make shift shelters because of intense flooding in the Southern states of Andhra Pradesh , Karnataka according to Al Jazeera and other news outlets

The Press Trust of India reports that the death toll has now hit 269.

"Dharmana Prasada Rao, Andhra Pradesh's minister for revenue and relief, said: 'These are the worst floods in 100 years'."

Compounding all of this is the impact on crops, Andhra Pradesh my home province is know as the Rice Bowl of India, the floods have hit the rice paddy crop, the onion and the sugar cane crops.

Inida has already had higher than normal prices for rice and essential food stuffs now the situation will only get worse. The Hindu reports that the country may have to import rice to meets its needs

Meanwhile, as flooded residents fill the 277 relief camps that dot the affected area, and as the waters begin to abate the big concern will be disease.

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jefhow22

at 15:51 on October 6th, 2009

Some may say that this is proof of global warming...which I do not buy into...my thoughts are of the normal cycle of the earths climate changes...wondering what caused the global freezing better known as the Ice Age...too much Ozone?

René

at 17:56 on October 6th, 2009

but this happens every year in India, and if it isn't India, it's Bangladesh, or Pakistan, or Afghanistan, or back to India.

If you know where the floodplains are, why are you living there? and if there are too many people, there's the dreaded 'birth control.'

Isn't this like using floods, famine, tsumanis, typhoons as population control?

jefhow22

at 16:12 on October 6th, 2009

My heart goes out to the millions of people that are been devastated by this flooding. Relief efforts must be very frustrating to both those in need and those trying to help. And along with trying to cope with this horrible situation are those that are trying to benefit by taking over relief centers by force and using the goods as bait for their own purposes...to control, terrorize, and profit off this horrible catastrophy.

wmwirigi

at 01:19 on October 8th, 2009

hope this shall never have to happen again, india has a strong government that should be more responsive to the needs of its people, hope the prime minister can look into that urgent