HEAVY RAINS battered several parts of Madhya Pradesh, including Bhopal where an alert was sounded today, throwing life out of gear.
Besides, flight operations and road traffic were also affected even as death toll in current monsoon rains mounted to 136 with nine fresh casualties.
Incessant downpour inundated roads linking several districts snapping vital connectivity as a number of culverts and small bridges were washed away by strong currents of overflowing nullahs and rivulets, official sources said.
Worst-hit were districts like Vidisha, Hoshangabad, Jabalpur, Sagar, Balaghat, Sehore and Datia besides the State capital where the administration sounded an alert, they said.
Schools remained closed in Bhopal and offices recorded a thin attendance. In all, nine deaths were reported from different places since yesterday, the sources said, adding three persons, including a woman, drowned at Sattasemadhana and Bihara villages of Sagar district while two persons were swept away by gushing water from a rivulet in Ujjain district.
One person died after being caught under an uprooted tree in Damoh. Two deaths were reported from Gwalior due to electrocution while a woman – Geetabai Bilala of Bodagaon village in Rajgarh was killed as a wall of her house collapsed.
Helicopters were summoned to rescue at least 70 people in seven villages of Vidisha district who were marooned as water gushed from a dam in neighbouring Raisen district following a breach, the official sources said.
At Raisen the Piplai Dam burst causing major waterlogging in three villages that had to be evacuated. Divisional Commissioner K K Singh ordered suspension of four engineers for negligence in the matter. The villagers of Dhaniakhedi, Mader and Rangpura were evacuated and placed in four relief camps. In Ashoknagar, residents of two villages – Sabalheda and Dichidi in Mungawli district were reportedly marooned owing to the heavy rains.
{{/usCountry}}At Raisen the Piplai Dam burst causing major waterlogging in three villages that had to be evacuated. Divisional Commissioner K K Singh ordered suspension of four engineers for negligence in the matter. The villagers of Dhaniakhedi, Mader and Rangpura were evacuated and placed in four relief camps. In Ashoknagar, residents of two villages – Sabalheda and Dichidi in Mungawli district were reportedly marooned owing to the heavy rains.
{{/usCountry}}The district and police administration had reached the villages and trying to evacuate the residents. The water level in rivers rose sharply forcing opening of 12 sluice gates of Indira Sagar dam at Khandwa and nine gates of Bargi dam on Narmada river at Jabalpur.
Several road links including Bhopal-Indore (for some part of day), Bhopal-Sagar, the Agra-Bombay Road at Rajgarh, Rajgarh-Jaipur Road, Raisen-Vidisha, Budhni-Shahganj, Budhni-Rehti, Bhopal-Berasia, Bhopal-Betul and Bhopal-Pachmarhi Roads were obstructed owing to the heavy rainfall.
Rains lash: Heavy rains lashed almost entire state during the last 24 hours. Though towards Friday evening, the weather system moved out to Rajasthan and was moving in further northwest direction. Forecasting heavy rains in western part of the State, the Meteorological Department has issued a warning in Sagar, Ujjain, Gwalior and Chambal divisions.