One dead as rains choke India’s tech capital

Rapid growth of the southern city dubbed India’s Silicon Valley has left many waterways covered over or used as dumps, leading to water stagnating every year during heavy rains. (AFP)
Short Url
Updated 20 May 2025
Follow

One dead as rains choke India’s tech capital

  • The Times of India newspaper reported Tuesday at least three people had died

Bengaluru, India: Torrential rains have swamped parts of India’s tech capital Bengaluru, killing at least one person, an official said, and exposing long-standing infrastructure failures in a city that has expanded at breakneck speed.

Rapid growth of the southern city dubbed India’s Silicon Valley has left many waterways covered over or used as dumps, leading to water stagnating every year during heavy rains.

“Storm water drains are encroached upon, the drains are shallow and small, and they are filled with silt,” chief minister of Karnataka state Siddaramaiah said late Monday.

“Instructions have been given to the municipal corporation multiple times to clear them, and work is still ongoing,” he added.

Siddaramaiah said it was a “matter of sorrow that a woman lost her life” in Bengaluru, the state capital which is home to more than 10 million people.

The Times of India newspaper reported Tuesday at least three people had died.

India is hit by torrential rains and flash floods each year during the monsoon season, and experts say climate change is increasing their frequency and severity.


Zelensky to meet European leaders in Berlin Monday: Germany

Updated 51 min 21 sec ago
Follow

Zelensky to meet European leaders in Berlin Monday: Germany

BERLIN: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is set to travel to Berlin on Monday and meet European leaders as well as the heads of the EU and NATO, German government spokesman Stefan Kornelius said.
Zelensky will attend a German-Ukrainian business forum and discuss “the status of peace negotiations in Ukraine” with Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Kornelius said on Friday.
“In the evening, numerous European heads of state and government, as well as the leaders of the EU and NATO, will join the talks,” he said in a statement.
Britain’s Prime Minister Keir Starmer will be among the leaders attending the talks in Berlin, a UK government official said.
The meeting will be part of a flurry of diplomacy around a plan to end the conflict in Ukraine originally proposed by US President Donald Trump last month.
Ukrainian officials on Wednesday said they had sent Washington an updated version of the plan, building on Trump’s original 28-point proposal.