Cloud burst in HP floods 3000 lives with grief

CHIRGAON , Aug 15: Screams of women and a trail of death are all that is left behind in Chirgaon. When the cloud burst came on Monday night...

CHIRGAON , Aug 15: Screams of women and a trail of death are all that is left behind in Chirgaon. When the cloud burst came on Monday night in this bustling, up-coming trade centre in Shimla district after three days of rain, it swept away the entire township and left its population of 2,500-3,000 homeless.

The death toll varying from 115 officials to 200 locals is expected to rise further as people remain missing. Where houses used to be stand five-six ft mounds of mud and stones. Big boulders and uprooted trees complete the picture. The Andhra river, the culprit for the floods, has broken its banks and now runs through Chirgaon.

Three minutes, says a survivor, Sohan Lal, is all it took for his world to come tumbling down. 8220;I tried to save my wife when gushing water entered our house around 8.30 p.m. But she was swept away before I could do anything.8221;

Puran Chand lost his wife Sandhya and daughter Sharda, whose marriage was slated for this month. Village pradhan Kesar Singh, his wife and child also could not save themselves.

A woman survivor recalls Singh had rushed to the roof of his house to warn the villagers to shift to safer places. But he found his own house crumbling and cried for help. However, before anyone could do anything, his wife, a child and two guests had been washed away.

Nearly 50 families have been completely wiped out, and dozens others have lost half their members. Nine people of the families of Mansa Ram and Ganga Ram, seven of the family of Nand Lal, seven of the family of Vir Singh, five of the family of Vidya Nand, six Nepali labourers and six Kashmiri labourers are till now among the dead.

The whereabouts of four employees of the Himachal Pradesh State Electricity Board, working at its Andhra project, are not yet known. A 14-year-old girl stuck in the tree logs was rescued yesterday morning.

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Nine deaths have also been reported from Ghusali village, and 28 from Wangtoo and Manglad areas of Kinnaur district, which also saw flash floods. Seven Kashmiri labourers working in Ghusali are reported missing.

Chirgaon residents claim the whereabouts of a number of labourers staying in their township Tibetans and Nepalis is also unknown. Worse, there is no exact estimate of their numbers. Deputy Commissioner Manisha Shridhar, who has been camping in Chirgaon, admits the toll could rise.

The loss has not only been in terms of lives. The 15-km road from Chirgaon to Rohru, the township8217;s only communication link to the outside, has been damaged at two vital points.

The Government properties destroyed include the 70-MW Andhra project estimated cost Rs 15 crore, forest rest house, tehsil office, veterinary hospital, police post, Panchayat Bhavan and the Himachal Pradesh State Cooperative Bank. Power supply has been completely disrupted and officials say it may take nearly two months to start generators at the Andhra project and Neogli in Kinnaur district.

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In Wangtoo, the destruction has been more widespread. A six-km stretch of Hindustan-Tibet National Highway between Bhabha Nagar and Tapri has been submerged and the Wangtoo bridge, which provides a vital link to Kinnaur, is under 20-feet deep water. The officials are yet to determine whether anything is left of it.

Huge machinery of the Nathpa-Jhakri Power Project at Nathpa has also been swept away by flood waters. So has been an entire colony of the project located at Bhaba.