Snakes compound South Asia flood victims’ miseries

* Hundreds of snakes enter village homes killing many

BHUBANESWAR: Hundreds of snakes, forced out of their pits by flood waters, have entered villagers’ homes in eastern India creating panic and adding to the torment caused by monsoon flooding, officials said on Friday.

Around 1,850 people have been killed - scores of them due to snake bites - since July when swollen rivers burst their banks, inundating huge areas in eastern India and Bangladesh. The others have been killed by drowning, diarrhoea and in house collapses. In India’s impoverished state of Orissa, poisonous snakes like kraits and cobras slithered into homes across dozens of villages in Balasore district after nearby forest areas were inundated, forcing villagers to flee with their cattle.

“We might survive the floods but there are numerous snakes crawling all over the place,” said Bijoy Pradhan, a villager who fled his home to dry land, on Friday. Two children died from snake bites overnight in the area as close to a million people remained marooned across the state. Authorities in Orissa said they were also battling an outbreak of diarrhoea that has killed six children since Thursday.

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