At least 11 dead in J-K as cloudburst strikes Ramban, landslide hits Reasi

At least eleven people, including five children, were killed in two separate incidents in Jammu and Kashmir as a cloudburst struck Ramban on Saturday morning and a landslide hit a house in Reasi.

Four villagers were killed and a few others are suspected to be missing in Ramban after a cloudburst led to flash floods in Rajgarh tehsil of Ramban, officials said. Rescue and relief teams were immediately rushed to the area. While four bodies have been recovered, a search is on for other missing persons, officials added.

“As of now, there are reports that five people are unaccounted for. We are searching for them. The flash floods have also damaged property in the area,” an official said.

In a separate incident, a landslide hit the Mahore area of Reasi district on Saturday morning, burying a house under the debris. Seven people, including a couple and their five children, all below the age of 12, died in the incident.

Over the last two weeks, intense rains, cloudbursts and landslides have wreaked havoc in the Jammu region, leading to over 115 deaths, most of them pilgrims. While 65 pilgrims were killed when a cloudburst hit Chishoti village of Padder in Kishtwar during the annual Machail Mata Yatra, 30 pilgrims were killed when a landslide hit an area near the Mata Vaishnodevi shrine in Jammu.

The government on Friday announced a committee to probe the landslide deaths at the Katra shrine and to find the cause of the landslide, assess response in the form of rescue and relief, and suggest SOPs to prevent the recurrence of such incidents.

The flash floods and floods triggered by the heavy rain and cloudbursts have damaged property worth thousands of crores in the region.