A total of 25 people have died in various rain-related incidents across Tamil Nadu in the past four days, including 17 persons in house collapses near Coimbatore, the state government said yesterday.
Chief Minister K Palaniswami chaired a meeting of officials at the state secretariat to review relief and rescue efforts and the precautionary steps to be taken.
In a statement issued here, the government said Rs400,000 compensation will be paid from the Disaster Relief Fund to families of the people who died in the collapse of houses near Coimbatore.
According to the police, at around 5.30am, a 20-foot wall fell on four houses, resulting in their collapse and killing the sleeping occupants.
Police and fire service officials removed the debris and recovered the bodies which have been sent for post-mortem.
The statement said apart from the 17 who died in the house collapse, eight others lost their lives between November 29 to December 1 and eight were injured.
The government said 58 livestock died due to rains, while 1,305 thatched huts and 465 tiled houses were also damaged and compensation will be paid to all the affected.
For farmers whose crops were damaged, the government said that compensation from crop insurers would be secured while financial assistance will first be provided out of the Disaster Relief Fund.
According to the government, 805 people have been housed in four relief camps in Cuddalore, 73 in two camps in Tuticorin and 38 in two camps in Tirunelveli.
Meanwhile, the Met department yesterday issued a thunderstorm warning for coastal and south interior Karnataka.
In addition to the thunderstorm, isolated heavy rain was also expected in the areas.
Coastal Karnataka comprises the districts of Dakshina Kannada, Udupi and Uttara Kannada.
The south interior region comprises Ballari, Bengaluru rural, Bengaluru urban, Chamaraja Nagar, Chikkaballapura, Chikkamagaluru, Chitradurga, Davanagere, Hassan, Kodagu, Kolar, Mandya, Mysuru, Ramanagara, Shivamogga and Tumkur.
Following three days of isolated rainfall, the two regions were expected to experience dry weather on Friday and Saturday, the official said.
However, north interior Karnataka, comprising 11 districts, has been forecast to receive isolated downpours and dry weather on Thursday, Friday and Saturday.
Bengaluru is expected to be generally cloudy today with a few spells of rain, accompanied by fog and mist in the morning.
On Sunday, no rainfall was recorded in coastal Karnataka while only 0.2mm downpour registered in Koppal district in north interior Karnataka.
Except Mysuru in south interior Karnataka, all other districts received rainfall on Sunday. Kolar recorded the highest rainfall at 9.6mm. Bengaluru registered 5.5mm rainfall on Sunday.