Death toll in Kolkata tempest rise to 18; ex-gratia of Rs 2 lakh announced

Gusty winds of 98 kmph, which swept the city from for 40 minutes on Tuesday evening, has caused massive damages.
A man inspects a damaged car after heavy storm and rain in Kolkata on Wednesday. | PTI
A man inspects a damaged car after heavy storm and rain in Kolkata on Wednesday. | PTI

KOLKATA: The death toll in the tempest that ravaged Kolkata and other parts of south Bengal
on Tuesday night rose to 18 on Wednesday. The state government declared a compensation of Rs 2 lakh each to the kin of the deceased.

Preliminary investigation has found that most of the people died due to falling of trees on them. Gusty winds of 98 kmph, which swept the city from for 40 minutes on Tuesday evening, has caused massive damage to property by uprooting trees, bending electric posts and disrupting train services in the Howrah and Sealdah sections of the train network in south Bengal.

Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee wanted to know from the Regional Meteorological Centre in Alipore why they did not alert the administration of the impending storm. “A total of 18 people have died in
the storm. We are extending all help to affected people. Work was done on a war footing in Kolkata without which vehicular movement would have been disrupted,” she said.

According to government estimates, some 303 trees in Kolkata and Howrah were uprooted, 225 electricity posts were damaged and 56 villages of South 24 Parganas were badly affected. Some 560 houses in
Howrah district, 52 in Hooghly, 100 in North 24 Parganas and 1050 in Kolkata districts were fully damaged whereas 2684 houses have been damaged partially throughout south Bengal.

Of the 18 dead, eight are from Kolkata, six from Howrah, one each from Hooghly and North 24 Parganas and two from Bankura.

However, Met department stated that no more thundershowers were expected on Wednesday. According to RMC, the velocity of the winds was less by just a fraction than that during the 2009 Cyclone Aila that
claimed more than 300 lives in India and Bangladesh and rendered lakhs homeless.

Though railway and metro services limped back to normalcy in Kolkata, the uprooted trees on the roads affected transportation in some parts of the city.

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