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Desperation sets in as
flood toll climbs: AFP

The estimated death toll in devastating floods in West Bengal climbed to 865 Friday, as relief workers warned of the desperate plight of villagers still cut off by the flood waters.

West Bengal Deputy Chief Minister Buddhadev Bhattacharya said 640 bodies had been recovered over 10 days, while 225 people are missing and presumed dead.

Unofficial estimates put the toll at more than 1,000.

In Krishnanagr, 100 kilometres north of Calcutta, police were forced to fire in the air Thursday evening to disperse a mob demanding access to relief supplies.

The crowd turned violent after a leader of the protest was arrested by police.

According to Bhattacharya, flooding had assumed "alarming proportions" in Bangaon, some 70 kilometres north-east of Calcutta, where a flash flood swept away four personnel of the Border Security Force from their post on the frontier with Bangladesh.

Relief worker Haripada Roy, who returned to Calcutta on Friday from a newly-set up relief camp in Bangaon, painted a grisly picture of the situation in the district where flood waters have covered the ghats, where bodies are normally cremated.

"There is nowhere to store the bodies, some of which are simply being thrown into the water," Roy told reporters.

"Army boats and state relief workers have been battling strong currents to try and reach affected areas, but have been unsuccessful."

Roy said thousands of people were crowding highways and elevated railway tracks to escape the flood water, while hundreds others had crammed themselves precariously onto wooden boats.

In Calcutta, water levels of the Hooghly continued to run dangerously high, with flooding reported in some south-western districts of the city. Some 200 hundred families have already been evacuated from low-lying areas alongside the river.

A team of experts from the central government in New Delhi arrived in Calcutta Friday to assess the situation amid calls from the West Bengal government for substantial federal aid.

State Chief Minister Jyoti Basu had called on the Union government to declare the floods a "national calamity".

In Bangladesh, which began to receive an over-spill from the floods last weekend, the official death toll rose to 38 Friday, as fears rose of an outbreak of waterborne diseases.

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