Kozhikode: The respective district administrations of Wayanad and Malapp-uram stopped the search for missing people after 18 days on Tuesday.
But bodies of 16 people are yet to be found in Puthumala and Kavala-ppara devastated by landslides. At Kavalappara, among the 59 missing people, 11 bodies are yet to be found. At Puthumala, among the 17 missing people, 12 bodies were retrieved. A woman’s body is yet to be identified. Sub-collector N.S.K. Umesh told reporters that the search operations were the largest witnessed by the district.
Experts from National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), army, fire and rescue, police and many volunteers were searching for bodies since the tragedy struck on August 8. The ‘Operation Puthumala’ began the same night under the leadership of Mr Umesh.
He said that families of those still missing in the disaster also would get the compensation. “We’ll follow the same legal procedures took during the Cyclone Ockhi,” he said.
“The search operations stopped with the full consent of all the kith and kin of missing.” The NDRF had brought ground-penetrating radar, and the state ensured services of sniffer dogs, but the efforts proved futile.
Decision on another round of search will be decided after high-level discussions later.
