Authorities in India’s western Gujarat state have evacuated more than 44,000 people from coastal areas and moved them to temporary shelters as the state braces for Cyclone Biparjoy.
The storm in the east-central Arabian Sea, about 350km south-west of Porbanda, was expected to make landfall on Thursday, bringing with it heavy rainfall, gusty winds and a coastal storm surge in parts of India and Pakistan.
The Indian Meteorological Department said the cyclone was likely to move north-eastwards and cross Saurashtra and Kutch districts in Gujarat and adjoining coasts of Pakistan on Thursday.
“It is likely to move as a very severe cyclonic storm with maximum sustained wind speed of 125-135kph gusting to 150kph,” the department said on Wednesday.
The federal weather agency said that a storm surge of two to three metres could inundate the low-lying areas of districts during the time of landfall.
Extremely heavy rainfall and strong winds in the region have been predicted and people have been advised to stay indoors.
Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Wednesday spoke to the military commanders and reviewed the preparedness of the Armed Forces for the landfall.
“The armed forces are ready to provide every possible assistance to civil authorities in tackling any situation or contingency due to the cyclone,” Mr Singh said.
As many as 17 teams from the National Disaster Response Force and a dozen teams of state disaster forces, 115 teams of state road and building department workers and 397 teams from the state electricity department have been stationed in eight districts across the state.
At least 69 trains have been cancelled and 32 trains were terminated short of their destination because of the inclement weather.
At least seven people, three in Kutch, including two children, and four others in Mumbai in neighbouring Maharashtra state, have drowned due to rough seas caused by the brewing cyclone.
In Pakistan's Sindh province, 64,000 people have been evacuated.
Sharjeel Inam Memon, the province's information minister, said about 86 per cent of those requiring evacuation had been relocated to safer areas.
The minister from the Pakistan People's Party stated that the provincial government was continuing efforts to evacuate additional citizens, with elected representatives from his party actively present on the ground, working in co-ordination with the provincial administration.
"We have left everything in our houses and came out to save lives," Ghulam Rehman, from the Keti Bandar port area, told The National.
"Most of our villagers are daily wage earners, and we used to go to the sea for fishing, but it has been banned for a few days, which has made our lives worse."
"We have been at the camp for the last two days, and we are worried about our houses because they will be destroyed in the cyclone," added Mr Raheem.
Sardar Sarfraz, chief meteorologist at the Pakistan Meteorological Department, told The National that the cyclone had moved north-northwestward over the past six hours and is located about 340km south-southwest of Karachi, 355km south-southwest of Thatta and 275km south-southwest of Keti Bandar.
“Widespread wind-dust storms, thunderstorms and rainfall” are expected in several districts of Sindh, including Thatta, Sujawal, Badin, Tharparker, Mirpurkhas and Umerkot, during the period of June 14 to 17, he added.
The Pakistani Navy in a statement said that troops had evacuated 700 people from various villages in Shah Bandar and 64 fishermen had been rescued from the sea.
“A cyclone monitoring cell is activated at Headquarters Commander Karachi whereas PN Joint Maritime Information Co-ordination Centre is relaying information at regular intervals to all stakeholders especially fishermen community,” it said in a statement.
Naval emergency response and medical teams have been deployed in coastal areas of Balochistan and rural areas of Sindh, including Hyderabad, Shaheed Benazirabad, Sukkur and Sanghar, while naval ships were maintaining vigilance in the open sea, it added.
