About one million people have been displaced from rain-swept villages in heavy monsoon flooding in northern and central Bangladesh, officials said on Monday.
Seven others were killed and thousands more are stranded in the muddy hinterland.
More than 40 000 people were driven from their fragile mud-wall huts in a new wave of flooding over the weekend in the worst-affected northern Rangpur region.
The region’s major river Teesta overflowed its banks, inundating fresh areas in at least seven northern districts.
”We have confirmed reports that thousands of people were forced to abandon their flooded abodes and seek shelter in schools and government buildings,” said district commissioner Nazrul Islam Khan.
Khan added that an emergency rescue operation has been launched for the flood-distressed people.
The death toll in the current floods rose to seven since the two mighty regional rivers, the Ganges and the Brahmaputra, recorded rises above the danger mark on Friday, overflowing into homes and farmlands and destroying roads and electricity poles.
In several parts of central Bangladesh, heavy showers triggered by the monsoon threw rivers into spate, which in turn set off earth slides, rescue workers said.
Earlier, disaster management officials said about 100 000 people were fighting the elements in villages isolated by flood waters.
This is the second wave of flooding in less than two months in Bangladesh, where floods are common during the northeast monsoon from June to September.
The floods force tens of thousands of people in rural areas to abandon homes and farms and seek shelter in community centres in the dry highlands. — Sapa-DPA