Vadodara: 499 mm rainfall over 24 hours wreaks havoc

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Four persons died in a wall collapse in Bajwa area late on Wednesday, and Vadodara district collector Shalini Agarwal told PTI that the body of an unknown man was recovered from Khodiyarna-gar area Thursday. “The administration has shifted more than 4,500 people to safer places and evacuated 1,200 persons who were stranded in houses due to water-logging,” she said.

People stranded on a flooded street in Vadodara on Thursday. (Express photo by Bhupendra Rana)

Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani held a meeting in state capital Gandhinagar to take stock of the situation. He said that 75,000 food packets were prepared for distribution to people stranded in the waterlogged areas.

Rupani said that the Prime Minister’s Office was constantly in touch with the state government over the situation in Vadodara and five additional teams of NDRF were flown in from Pune. Four NDRF teams are already in Vadodara, he added. Four teams of SDRF, two teams of Army and two companies of State Reserve Police were also deployed for rescue operations.

Two columns of the Army comprising 140 men were assisting the local administration, while two additional columns were kept on stand-by. The Indian Air Force (IAF) stationed two medium lift M-17 helicopters at Vadodara.