KADAPA: Chintha Savithramma had made it to safety along with her family and several other villagers, but her attempt to save valuables kept at home cost her life. The woman in her late 70s was among others who had taken refuge in Dasallamma temple before the water from the breached Annamayya project gushed into Ramachandrapuram in Thogurupeta panchayat.
It was after reaching the temple that she remembered the Rs 8 lakh cash and gold, worth Rs 15 lakh, kept at home for her 26-year-old grandson Amarnath Reddy’s wedding. Ignoring others’ warnings, she rushed back to secure the cash and valuables, only to be swept away by the floodwaters that devastated the village. Reddy was to get married on November 21. His family had made all arrangements for the wedding which was to be solemnised at a hall in Ontimetta.
The flash flood derailed the family’s plan. Five days after his scheduled--now postponed--wedding, Reddy, bereaved and still single, sat on a mount of rubble that was till recently his home. Reddy, a post-graduate, has been employed with an impressive pay package in Hyderabad since 2018. He returned to his village on November 12 to oversee the arrangements for his wedding. “We warned her against returning to the village, but she did not listen. The floodwaters came gushing as she was entering the village, and she was swept away,” Reddy said, even as he and his family were still hoping to find her — or at least her body.