Storm kills 30 in Assam, 4,000 hit

At least 30 people including 16 women have been killed and over 600 injured, 200 of them seriously, when a severe thunder squall — Bord...

At least 30 people including 16 women have been killed and over 600 injured, 200 of them seriously, when a severe thunder squall — Bordoichila in local parlance — swept across eight villages in the Kalapani area in Dhubri district in the Assam-Bangladesh border on Tuesday.

The storm that lasted over 30 minutes blew off a large number of houses and rendered over 4,000 homeless. Unofficial sources put the deaths between 100 and 150, most of them children and women.

It began at around 5:30 pm and the impact was felt in the nearby township of Mankachar, according to PC Bordoloi, Superintendent of Police, Dhubri.

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Dhubri Additional Deputy Commissioner Azad Sheikh told The Indian Express over telephone that district authorities have set up temporary relief camps in schools in the locality while relief materials and medical aid have been rushed.

The villages that have been devastated by the squall are Chirakhowa, Chirakhowa-Topapara, Pipulbari Part 1, Pipulbari Part 2, Baliabeel, Bhurakata, Bengerbhita and Bauskata.