Salvage operations in the earthquake-hit Himalayan country is becoming a 'time consuming' affair
Vijayan said the news that the SDMA had directed scientific institutions and scientists not to visit the disaster-affected Meppadi panchayat in Wayanad and not to express their opinions was misleading.
Heavy rain continued to lash Chennai and other parts of Tamil Nadu on Wednesday, bringing residential neighborhoods and roads under knee-deep water and leading to traffic congestion besides affecting public transport services.
The cyclonic storm is likely to make landfall between Bhitarkanika National Park and Dhamra Port in Odisha early Friday with wind speeds of up to 120 kilometres per hour (kmph), it said.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Wednesday that violence in Manipur is continuously declining and educational institutes along with businesses have opened in most parts of the state.
Rescue operations in Kerala's Wayanad district resumed on Thursday, marking one of the largest efforts to save those stranded by the landslides that have hit the region.
The 100-foot-tall illegal billboard fell at a petrol pump in Ghatkopar during dust storms and unseasonal rains that lashed Mumbai on Monday.
In one of the worst natural disasters in Kerala, at least 123 persons were killed and 128 injured in massive landslides triggered by torrential rains in Wayanad on Tuesday. With hundreds trapped under the debris, sparking fears of mounting fatalities, rescue agencies were racing against time to pull out any survivors.
More than 4.5 lakh pilgrims paid their obeisance at the natural ice Shiva Lingam formation inside the cave shrine last year.
The administration is geared up for more showers as the India meteorological department has warned of heavy to very heavy rains with isolated extremely heavy rains in several districts of the state till Thursday morning.
India on Tuesday pressed six more teams of National Disaster Response Force personnel into its relief and rescue operations in Nepal.
'We expect the movements to come down to a trickle or even to stop at all these places,' says NDRF DG Satya Pradhan.
'It was a war-like situation, but instead of enemy fire, we fought against the vagaries of nature,' says Major Seeta Shelke.
Due to heavy rains and waterlogging over the tracks at several locations on South Central Railway network, as many as 99 trains were cancelled and four trains were partially cancelled while 54 trains were diverted, an SCR official said.
She said that the borewell surrounding was completely locked when the rescue teams arrived and added that the police are looking into the matter.
The next two days are very crucial in terms of rescuing the maximum number of pilgrims and tourists stranded in rain-hit Uttarakhand as heavy showers may come anytime, a senior official said.
This is the first cyclone in the Bay of Bengal this pre-monsoon season.
At least five people were killed in separate rain-related incidents on Tuesday in Bengaluru, which has been reeling under incessant rains for the past three days causing widespread flooding in several residential areas and turning roads into virtual rivers.
The national calamity response force, NDRF feels it is time that citizens are "trained" in combating both man-made and natural catastrophes.
A large number of logs had floated into the reservoir following heavy rains in the past few days and the five employees along with some locals had gone to take stock of the situation.
Some people broke down at the shock of seeing the cold and injured bodies of their loved ones, while others heaved a sigh of relief that their kin were not among the deceased.
In a bid to enhance preparedness for disaster management among government officials involved in management of the annual Amarnath Yatra starting July 2, National Disaster Management Authority has planed to conduct a three-day mock drill.
The bodies of three labourers were on Saturday pulled from the rubble of a wall that collapsed at a construction site in the Vasant Vihar area in New Delhi amid heavy rain, officials said.
As Cyclone Dana barrels toward the coasts of Odisha, threatening to impact nearly half of the state's population, the government is racing against time to execute a massive evacuation plan aimed at relocating about 10 lakh people in several coastal districts to safety. In West Bengal, the cyclone is set to bring heavy rainfall in several southern West Bengal districts, including Kolkata, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) has said.
Indian cricket fraternity reacts to Silkyara tunnel rescue
The Centre has assured all help to Odisha and Andhra Pradesh where a "very severe" cyclone is expected to hit on Saturday and sent nearly 500 personnel of National Disaster Response Force for relief and rescue operations.
Officials said around 1,300 pilgrims are stranded in Kedarnath, Bhimbali and Gaurikund, and are safe.
An NDRF personnel went through the passage, pushing a wheeled stretcher tied to a rope at the end of the tunnel and was pulled back up after completing the stretch.
Rescue operations were underway on Friday to trace over 45 people missing following flash floods triggered by cloudbursts in three districts of Himachal Pradesh, officials said on Friday.
With their near and dear ones gone and staring at an uncertain future, survivors recount their most traumatic experience ever that unfolded in the wee hours of July 30.
The situation in rain-battered Gujarat improved slightly on Thursday as the rainfall activity subsided, but Vadodara and some other parts of the state are still reeling under a flood-like situation due to overflowing rivers while the authorities continue the rescue and relief operations.
Some areas were under 10 to 12 feet of water, said health minister and government spokesperson Rushikesh Patel.
The Navy wanted to ascertain the water level as their divers can operate up to 100 feet in a closed container-type situation, a district official said.
Intermittent, widespread rains lashed Chennai and other regions of Tamil Nadu on Tuesday and the India meteorological department said the low pressure area over the Bay of Bengal has turned into a well-marked low pressure area and it is likely to become a depression.
At least 17 people were killed when torrential rains triggered a landslide at a village in Maharashtra's Pune district on Wednesday, burying over 160 as 400 NDRF personnel looked for survivors and bodies in the mud-and-rock debris battling inclement weather.
The basement of the coaching Institute in Old Rajendra Nagar where three civil services aspirants died by rain-induced flooding was functioning illegally as a library, officials said on Sunday.
Nine National Disaster Response Force teams were deployed for rescue operations following one of the worst railway disasters in India that killed at least 278 people and injured more than 900. According to official data, the force rescued 44 victims and retrieved 121 bodies from the spot.
Boring through the rubble of the collapsed Silkyara tunnel was put on hold again on Thursday apparently after cracks appeared in the platform on which the drilling machine rests, in a fresh hurdle to the rescue of 41 workers trapped inside for 11 days.
The IMD said that rainfall over India in August and September would be around 106 percent of the long-period average of 422.8 mm.
At least 16 people lost their lives in various rain-related incidents in Telangana while the unprecedented rainfall and floods in Andhra Pradesh over the past three days affected about 4.5 lakh people leading to the evacuation of more than 30,000 to relief camps.
