MINGORA: Around 800,000 people stranded in different areas of Swat district, including Kalam, Bahrain, Madian, Matta, Kabal and Samozai, are desperately looking for food and medicines as flash floods have swept away over 100 bridges, disconnecting entire area from rest of the country.
District Coordination Officer Asif Rehman told APP that local administration and Army were jointly carrying out relief operations in the flood hit areas. Aid will be distributed among 5000 families through helicopter service once the weather improves, he added.
So far 286 people have been killed and over 100 injured in the flood related incidents in various areas of the district. Besides, flood water swept away 52 villages and damaged crops scattered on one lakh acre area.
According to Naeem Akhtar, spokesman of civil administration, the revenue department has so far registered 120 deaths, destruction of 250 restaurants and 1526 damaged houses. He admitted that damages were on large scale and were beyond the capacity of provincial government.
Mohammad Ibrahim of Tehsil Matta said that floods have damaged infrastructure , which was built over 100 years ago, and swept away thousands of shops and restaurants.
The floods have also damaged two grid stations at Madyan and Khwazakela and partially damaged a hospital in Madman.
Residents of the areas said there was no electricity for the last 15 days which had disrupted all commercial and business activities across the district.
Local farmers say that fruits and vegetables worth millions of rupees are getting rotten as it is not possible to ship them to markets due to collapsed infrastructure.
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