MUMBAI: At least 16 people were killed on Thursday after a landslide smashed into their village in India’s Maharashtra state, officials said, with locals fearing the toll could rise significantly.

India’s National Disaster Response Force said that 16 people had been killed and that they had called off the rescue operations because of continuous rains and “threat of further landslide”. But volunteer Santosh Kumar feared the count could be higher.

“We did not count the dead bodies exactly but as per my estimate there were about 60 to 70 dead bodies. Out of which we buried about 12 to 14 bodies there itself,” Kumar said.

Rescue teams were battling lashing rain in the remote, hilly and forested Raigad district, with people scrambling at mounds of earth and rubble.

The state’s deputy chief minister Devendra Fadnavis said at least 1,000 workers were part of the rescue team. Fadnavis had said that around 200 people live in the area and that 70 had been rescued. Police officer Harish Kalsekar said earlier that nearly 50 people were feared buried under the debris.

“It is raining and the terrain is hilly, so heavy equipment can’t be moved there,” Kalsekar said. Interior Minister Amit Shah said the priority was “to evacuate people from the scene and treat the injured immediately”.

India has been battered by rains since the start of the monsoon season in June, and flooding and landslides have killed scores of people.

Monsoon rains are vital to replenishing rivers and groundwater, but the deluge also causes widespread destruction every year.

Experts say climate change is increasing the number of extreme weather events around the world, with damming, deforestation and development projects in India exacerbating the human toll.

Published in Dawn, July 21st, 2023