With five more deaths reported on Saturday, floods have claimed 13 lives in eastern UP so far, besides rendering thousands homeless. According to reports, two persons in Sitapur, two in Barabanki and one in Gonda washed away in flood.

About 10,000 people have been evacuated from nearly 200 inundated villages of eastern UP. The floods have been caused by rivers flowing from Nepal, as Saryu, Ghagra and Sharda are flowing above the danger level. According to officials, over 5 lakh cusec of water has been released this week from Banbasa and other barrages situated near the India-Nepal border, flooding villages in Shrawasti, Sitapur, Sant Kabir Nagar, Kushinagar, Maharajganj and Bahraich districts.

In Bahraich, nearly 200 villages have been inundated affecting nearly 3 lakh people. With water level reaching 17 cm above the danger mark in Barabanki, Vijay Mishra (30) of Lohtijai village and Suresh Gautam (25) of Patharia village died on Saturday. District Magistrate Vikas Gothwal has ordered the deployment of six platoons of PAC for evacuating the affected people. The Bahraich administration is busy evacuating the villagers. DM Subhash Sharma said, “For rescue operations, we have pressed into service a company of PAC and nearly 80 boats and motorboats.”

Sharda in Lakhimpur Khiri, Ghaghra in Bahraich, and Saryu in Ayodya are flowing above the danger mark. In Ambedkarnagar, Saryu is flowing nearly 8 m above the danger level. With two deaths reported due to flood in Faizabad so far, District Magistrate MP Agrawal said, “We have evacuated almost all the people trapped in floodwater.”