Meanwhile, many houses and cowsheds collapsed or washed away in Serthi and Bhadrana villages in Dharampur subdivision, but no casualties have been reported from the area so far.Around a dozen vehicles parked at Jail Road in Mandi were buried following a landslide. Many locals and students from Palace Colony, DIET, Bada, Bassi, Kutti, Rikki villages, and Government Degree College Karsog were rescued by teams of National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), State Disaster Response Force (SDRF), police, home guards, and District Disaster Management Authority (DDMA).Also, the people at Pandoh market were evacuated around midnight as a precautionary measure, as the water levels in the Beas rose dangerously high downstream due to controlled release from the Pandoh Dam as the gates of the dam were opened. There was no casualty and no one was reported trapped.Another fourteen people were evacuated from Raghunath ka Padhar and eleven were rescued from Purani Mandi after a sudden surge in the Beas River as the dam gates were opened.On the other hand, the State Disaster Response Force (SDRF) teams are on the spot and actively monitoring the evolving situation. A flash flood was also reported in the Bagi rivulet in the Kandi-Kataula area of the district.As per the report of Himachal Pradesh State Emergency Operations Centre, in the last nineteen hours, sixteen cloud bursts and three flash floods took place. Four people died, five were injured, 16 are missing, nine people are stranded, while 332 people have been evacuated, of these 278 in Mandi, 51 in Hamirpur and three in Chamba.While 30 animals died and one hydro electricity project damaged, 24 houses and 12 cow sheds and one bridge damaged. While 406 roads are closed across the State and 1515 electricity transformers and 171 water supply schemes are disrupted.The Kiratpur-Manali highway has been blocked at multiple places between Mandi and Kullu as landslides took place near Jhalogi Tunnel, Four Miles, and Pandoh, and the motorists were stranded inside road tunnels the whole night between Mandi and Aut.The vehicular movement from Mandi towards Kullu has been suspended due to safety reasons. Meanwhile, food and water was distributed to them by the volunteers of the district administration.Due to continuous rainfall the efforts to clear the highway have been severely hampered which started late Monday evening. The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) has deployed personnel and machinery to clear debris and restore traffic.Due to heavy rain in the upper catchment areas of Beas River it has led to a sharp increase in inflow at Pandoh Dam, thus the spill gates were opened to manage the water levels which caused the river to swell downstream.Warning sirens are being sounded continuously, and public announcement vehicles have been deployed to inform the public to stay away from the riverbanks. Meanwhile, as a precautionary measure, all educational institutes, including schools, remained closed in Mandi and Kangra districts on Tuesday.
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