At least 221 people have died and more than 1.5 million been displaced by monsoon flooding across India, Nepal and Bangladesh, officials said Tuesday, as rescuers scoured submerged villages for the missing.
In Nepal, severe flooding has left tens of thousands of homes totally underwater in the populous southern lowlands, with nearly 20 percent of the population affected.
"As per the data we have received so far, 111 have been killed, 35 are still missing and a search operation is underway," Home Minister Janardan Sharma told parliament Tuesday.
A third of neighbouring Bangladesh is flooded, with at least 29 dead as relentless monsoon rains pound the densely-populated riverine country.
"Another 1.5 million people have been marooned," Reaz Ahmed, head of Bangladesh's disaster management department told AFP.
Almost 1,200 shelters have been erected across Bangladesh, while the army has been deployed to reinforce weakened river embankments and to assist with search and rescue operations.
In the border district of Lalmonirhat, roughly 600 Indian nationals took shelter in Bangladeshi villages along with their stricken livestock.
India has also suffered from torrential downpours and flash flooding, and a worsening monsoon that has already claimed the lives of at least 81 people in the eastern states of Bihar and West Bengal, and northeastern Assam state, over the last few days.
Train services have been cut entirely to the northeast, and at least 200,000 people are living in emergency camps in Assam, a remote state that suffers frequent flooding during the annual rains.
In Nepal, residents in hard-hit Saptari district blamed the government for failing to solve the seasonal floods and quickly send aid to those in need.
 Source: France24
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