Monsoon Floods Cause Landslides in North East India, While the South East Remains Dry
A car makes its way through a flooded Indian street.
www.flickr.com user Prince Roy
While there’s been very little monsoon rain on the western coast of India lately, including in Mumbai, this hasn’t been the case on the opposite side of the country. West Bengal, Orrisa, Jharkhand, and Assam have all experienced torrential rain and flooding. This has caused a landslide in far north east Guwahati, and long distance train services to be disrupted from cities such as Kolkata (Calcutta) and Puri. Ten people have also died in Uttarakhand, near Dehradun and Rishikesh in northern India, as a result of landslides and other freak monsoon related accidents.
Meanwhile the state of Kerala, in south India, has remained so dry that there’s concern about future crops, power generation, and drinking water supply. Kerela missed out on the heavy rains usually expected in the first couple of weeks of June. However, you can benefit from this by visiting some of the state's attractions, such as Periyar National Park, which stay open during the monsoon season.
Comments
Hey the north east seems to be a sad travel destination for the monsoons because of excessive rain.. but the north, south and west seem to have some good destinations. this post gave me some info on them:http://www.yatra.com/blogs/2008/07/03/travel-destinations-for-indian-monsoons/
but overall I think India has very little travel options during teh monsoons.
I have friends in Rishikesh right now, and cannot find clearly whether there is serious flooding there as well…haven’t heard from them in days, so a bit worried. Any info would be welcome! Thanks!
Don’t worry, I think Rishikesh is okay at the moment. There haven’t been any negative weather reports in the papers in India. The state of Bihar is very flooded at the moment though. Hopefully your friends have just been busy (or subject to India’s unreliable nature!) and will get in contact soon.