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Anananova
The Indian
earthquake disaster could have killed up to 30,000 people in just
one city and there are about 125,000 people unaccounted for throughout
the region, officials said tonight.
More than
6,000 people have been confirmed dead and the number injured stands
at 14,500, but death and injury figures are likely to rise much
higher.
K N Mahure,
a fire brigade commander in charge of rescue efforts in Bhuj -
the hardest hit area in the western state of Gujarat - says: "There
may be 20,000 to 30,000 dead in Bhuj alone."
He says he
is basing his estimate on the number of people reported missing
and the number found dead after three days of searching. "But
we are finding people alive," he adds.
Gujarat Chief
Minister Keshubhai Patel says about 125,000 people were "not
accounted for" . He says many of them could be buried under
the rubble, while others may have left the state.
Haren Pandya,
Gujarat's home minister, says 6,072 people have been confirmed
to have died in Friday's quake and gives a more cautious prediction
of "at least 10,000 dead", adding that more than 14,500
people have been injured.
As frantic
rescue efforts continued today, soldiers digging through the ruins
of crushed buildings pursued the faint voices of survivors buried
alive beneath tonnes of rubble.
A three-year-old
girl was pulled alive from rubble in Anjar, 30 miles south-east
of Bhuj, where 400 children were buried under toppling buildings
as they marched in a holiday parade. A soldier who helped rescue
her said: "She was chanting some Arabic verses. She was totally
unscathed."
Nearby, rescuers
spent five hours chipping at stones until they freed a 50-year-old
man known only as Maganbhai. He was given sips of water as the
workers pounded away at the rubble trapping his legs until they
freed him.
In Bhuj, air
force troops and police followed the sounds of a baby's cry until
they made eye contact with her and her mother. Hours later, 18-month-old
Namrata was pulled out alive and rushed to an air force hospital,
but her mother Naina Badrasen Aur died before rescuers could reach
her.
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