Hundreds of rescuers have ended a four-day search for scores of people still missing after heavy monsoon rains triggered a massive landslide in a village in western India, an official said.
The rescue teams have recovered the bodies of 27 people killed following the landslide on Wednesday night that hit the village of Irshalwadi in the Raigadh district, located nearly 50 miles from Mumbai, the Maharashtra state capital.
Seventy-eight people were thought to be missing as of Sunday, said Deepak Avadh, an official from the National Disaster Response Force. The state government and the relief agency later decided to end search operations, Mr Avadh said, implying there was no hope of finding any survivors.
No more bodies were recovered on Sunday, he said.
At least 17 of the 48 houses in the village were fully or partially buried under the debris, officials said.
The dead included four children, the Press Trust of India news agency said, adding that 75 people were rescued. Four survivors were taken to hospital.
Rescuers mostly used rods and shovels. Heavy equipment such as earth movers and excavators could not reach the village with no paved roads and a massive sludge around it, said Mr Avadh.
A dog squad was also deployed to detect any survivors.
From the base of the hill, it takes about 90 minutes to reach Irshalwadi by foot.
Rainfall and a threat of more landslides caused the rescue operation to be suspended during the night the landslide occurred, the rescue agency said.
India’s weather department placed Maharashtra under alert as the state was lashed by incessant rains the past week.
Local train service was disrupted at several places with water flowing inside stations and over tracks, media reported.
Record monsoon rains have killed more than 100 people in northern India over the last three weeks, officials said, as the downpours caused roads to cave in and homes to collapse.
India regularly experiences severe floods during the monsoon season, which runs between June and September and brings most of South Asia’s annual rainfall.
The rains are crucial for rain-fed crops planted during the season but often cause extensive damage.
Scientists say monsoons are becoming more erratic because of climate change, leading to frequent landslides and flash floods in India’s Himalayan north.
