DHAKA, June 20 (Xinhua) -- The floods triggered by heavy seasonal rains and onrush of water have wreaked havoc in parts of Bangladesh with the deluge claiming more casualties Monday, taking the death toll to 20.
Millions of people have still been left marooned or homeless by the severe floods in about a dozen Bangladesh districts.
According to the daily flood report of the country's Health Emergency Operation Center and Control Room on Monday, at least eight people have died in lightning in the flood-hit areas of four Bangladesh districts while four died in a landslide in southeastern Chattogram district since June 16.
Another death was reported Monday from Sylhet's Sunamganj district, some 296 km northeast of Dhaka, where the body of a policeman who was washed away in flood waters on Thursday night was recovered on Saturday night.
Also, an ill-fated baby was swept away by the major Teesta after he slipped from his mother's lap on their way to a flood shelter on Sunday in Bangladesh's Gaibandha district, some 268 km northwest of capital Dhaka.
Apart from them, six more people died on Sunday with tens of thousands evacuated to nearly 1,000 flood shelters, mainly in the country's northeastern Sylhet and Sunamganj districts, where the entire six million population is reported to have been affected by the worst-ever floods in more than a century.
In the disaster situation report prepared by the country's National Disaster Response Coordination Center under the Ministry of Disaster Management and Relief, thousands of families were forced to flee home in about 10 Bangladesh districts.
Local TV reports showed widespread damage to habitation, crops, roads and highways across vast swathes of the country's mainly northeastern region due to the flooding.
According to Flood Forecasting and Warning Center, water levels in different rivers of the country may rise again this week, leading to fresh flooding in some areas.
Md Kamrul Hasan, secretary of Bangladesh's Ministry of Disaster Management and Relief, had earlier told Xinhua that tens of thousands of policemen, Bangladesh Army soldiers and emergency service staff members have been deployed in parts of the country to assist search and rescue efforts.
"Bangladesh Army soldiers have already been deployed as floods devastated the northeastern districts of Sunamganj and Sylhet," he said.
Officials said the onrush of water from hills across the Indian borders has virtually worsened the situation in the northeastern Sylhet region.
Bangladeshi State Minister for Disaster Management and Relief Md Enamur Rahman told journalists Saturday that both the government and private agencies of the country are working together in the Sylhet region, which has been facing the worst floods in 122 years. ■