UP residents continue search for missing relatives

 The Army, Air Force and the Uttarakhand government may have declared search and rescue operations in the flood-hit state to be over, but scores of people from Uttar Pradesh are camping in the state looking for their missing relatives in a desperate bid to locate them.

Hundreds of people from UP are still in Uttarakhand trying to trace their relatives missing in June’s floods for the past several days, according to reports.

People belonging to UP constitute the largest among the missing persons in the aftermath of the flood, with official figures revealing as much as 800 people from the state disappearing without a trace. 

Reports said anxious relatives are thronging public places like bus stands and hospitals with pictures of the missing ones in the hope of finding or getting information about them.
They are also taking the social networking route to find them.

Dr Pradeep Agarwal from Lucknow has been staying at a hotel at Rishikesh for the past 20 days in search of his sister, brother-in-law, nephew and father, who never returned from their trip to Uttarakhand.

His family members said Dr Agarwal also went up to Guptakashi to trace them but they could not be found.

Similarly Ram Narain Yadav, also a resident of the state capital, has been staying at
Dehradun for the past several days to find his missing father. He tried to search for him at Rudraprayag, but had to abandon his trip due to rains and landslide.

“The government may have stopped rescue operations but we have not lost hopes...our operations will continue,” Yadav's family members said.

The UP government, meanwhile, has said that about 229 people thought to be missing in the floods have returned safely.  Officials also said efforts are on to ascertain identities of bodies floating in the rivers and to see if any of them are from the state.

 
The state government was under attack from different quarters for its sluggish response to the tragedy. Many other survivors from the state also complained that the state government did not make arrangements to bring back the stranded pilgrims in the initial stages.

‘Glacier melting , floods not connected’

Chairman of Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) RK Pachauri has ruled out any connection between melting glaciers and Uttarakhand floods, pointing out that the flood was the result of heavy rains, DHNS reports from New Delhi. 

The climate scientist also suggested that traffic in ecological vulnerable places like Uttarakhand hills should be restricted by scaling down the number of tourists visiting the hill state, which will also reduce the loss of property and human lives in the event of natural disasters such as the June 16 floods.

    He said that incidence of heavy rains have increased in many areas, including in those areas where total amount of rainfall has seen a decline, which results in big loss of property and lives.  “There is a need for a well placed early warning system in these areas to reduce the loss.

Every section of society should be involved in the process including professionals, teachers and students,” he said while talking to media-persons. However, he declined to comment on the failure of the authorities to alert the people on time in Uttarakhand.