Heavy rains submerge houses, damage goods, leave people hungry in Uttarakhand's Rudrapur

Rudrapur (Uttarakhand) [India], October 21 : Residents of Shivpuri town in Rudrapur district of Uttarakhand are struggling after continuous heavy rains which have submerged their houses, damaged household goods and left them hungry.
Suman Yadav a resident said, "On the night of October 18, our houses got flooded with 5 feet of water. This ruined all our household belongings. More than half of items in our shops also were submerged. We are borrowing clothes from others. We have lost at least 1 lakh rupees."

Their house also developed some cracks due to rain.
Meenakshi, another resident says, "Our clothes, TV, Coolers etc. have been ruined. We had Rs 1000 in our house but we have lost that too. We also lost 30 kilograms of rice. We had our food in a school for 2 days but now we are cooking at our home."
Residents are trying to put their household items to use once again by drying them. Television sets, inverters and refrigerators were damaged by the rainwater in many households. Many people are left with no food supplies, which has left many people struggling with hunger.
Another resident, who was evacuated from her house said, "At around 2:00 AM when we were sleeping, our house got flooded with water. Due to consistent rains, people were inside their houses anyways. All of our household items were left submerged. I do some clothing-related work for living and all the clothes were ruined by the rainwater. We have lost everything."
Consistently heavy rains in the state left many areas submerged in water, due to which a lot of people struggled to find their way out of the rainwater and the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) rescued them.
People have complained that the administration has failed to provide help to them during such tough times.

However, Rudrapur MLA Rajkumar Thukral who was also in the town on Wednesday said, "I was here on October 19 as well and I have been coming here regularly. I have been providing food to people as well, at times using my own money. I have pressurised the administration to provide compensation to the people as soon as possible and an in-charge has been appointed for each area for the purpose of compensation. They will start their work from today. I have requested that a compensation of Rs 50,000 be provided to the ones affected by heavy rains. People can talk to me in case they need any help, I am here for them.
NDRF Inspector Monu Sharma, who has been rescuing people said, "Our team has been conducting operations here (Shivpuri) for last two days. 10 teams have been formed which have rescued 600-700 people in two days using our boats. Food has been distributed to at least 1,300 people as well. We have also saved people from Jagatpura and Thakur Nagar areas. We will go in these areas to find if anyone is still stuck and ask people if they need our help."

He said that the team encountered challenges like broken wires and rainwater but still managed to rescue people.
Amid torrential rains, the hilly state has witnessed flooded roads, buildings and overflowing rivers leaving people stranded in various places.
The death toll in rain-battered Uttarakhand has mounted to 46 following several incidents of flash floods and landslides in the past few days.