Dhangadi, June 12

Yet another storm hit the settlements in Kailari Rural Municipality and Dhangadi sub-metropolis in Kailali today, adding to the woes of victims of the first storm of last Thursday.

According to Dhangadi Mayor Nrip Bahadur Odd, villagers whose house roofs were blown away in the first storm were most affected by today’s storm accompanied by rainfall.

“After Thursday’s disaster, today’s storm damaged the remaining crops and other belongings in houses that had lost their roofs during the earlier storm,” said the mayor, adding that 80 per cent non-concrete houses in Dhangadi were damaged.

Citing the scale of the disaster, the mayor has sought help for rescue, relief and rehabilitation of storm victims from the provincial and federal governments.

“At a time when we were finding it hard to provide relief to victims of the earlier storm, yet another storm has made our job even more difficult,” said the mayor.

Kalpana Nepali, a victim, said the recent storm has left her worried. “We were struggling to pick up pieces after the previous storm and lo and behold we were hit by yet another storm. I don’t know how we’ll survive,” said the mother of a one-month-old baby. Further, Kalpana said she hadn’t eaten a full meal for the past one week.

“After the previous storm blew away the roof of our house, we put a new roof by borrowing money from a local money lender. My husband is in India to earn money and repay the debt and here we are hit by one storm after another,” she added.

According to official data, 1,835 houses were completely damaged by last week’s storm in Dhangadi, while the total number of houses impacted by the storm stood at 2,200 in the entire district.

Kailali’s Assistant Chief District Officer Mohan Joshi said his office was collecting details of the damage caused by today’s storm.