Lalit Mohan

Tribune News Service

Dharamsala, July 14

Three more bodies were recovered on Wednesday from debris of massive landslide that hit Boh valley’s Rulehar village in Kangra district. With this toll due to landslide has risen to eight.

Two more are still missing and are presumed to be dead.

Till the filing of this report the efforts to retrieve the bodies of missing persons were continuing.

Those whose bodies were retrieved today include Bhim Sen, Kanchana Devi and a one-and-a-half-year-old girl child. The entire family of Bhim Sen, including his wife, two daughters and a son, was wiped out in the landslide.

The deputy commissioner, Kangra, Nipun Jindal said search and rescue operations in Boh valley were still continuing and shall continue till all bodies were recovered. One body was recovered on the first day when landslide occurred, four bodies recovered yesterday and three bodies have been recovered today, he said.

He said the district administration conducted the post mortem of the deceased on the spot and also made arrangements for cremation. Those injured were being provided free medical aid. One of the injured was undergoing treatment in PGI, Chandigarh, he said.

He further said a 55-year-old male from Samirpur village near Kangra had been washed away in flash flood on July 12. He was still missing and efforts are being made to locate him.

All tourists trapped in Kareri area have been rescued. Punjabi Sufi singer Manmeet Singh, a resident of Amritsar, had died after falling into a gorge on July 12. His body was recovered yesterday, he said.

Sources here said there was tension among the slum dwellers and locals who have been housed in Bagli government school after flash flood in Manjhi river on July 12. Sources added that locals were objecting to staying with slum dwellers under one roof in government school. The district administration had offered to house locals at an alternative location. Four houses were destroyed in flash flood in Bagli village on July 12. Many slum dwellers and those who lost their houses have been given shelter in government school at Bagli by the district administration.