KORAPUT/BHUBANESWAR: More than 5,000 villagers of Ralegada and Dhuliput panchayats under the Chitrakonda area of Malkangiri district remained cut off from the district headquarters on Sunday as the water level of the Sarkubandha river increased following continuous rainfall since Saturday evening.Two women died in lightning strikes while working on their farms in Attabira block of Bargarh district on Sunday. Two others were injured and have been hospitalized.The situation in Nuapada district was also grim. Following heavy rain in the upper catchment areas, water from the Lower Indravati project inundated Jhalkusuma village in the district.The road link between Binika and Gulipada in Subarnapur district was disrupted after water flowed over the Tali bridge on Saturday night.Special relief commissioner Bishnupada Sethi said the government was keeping a watch on the situation. "There is no cause for alarm yet," he said, adding that rain had subsided on Sunday.Collector (Malkangiri) Manish Agrawal said the situation in Ralegada and Dhuliput panchayats was expected to improve soon. "As there has been heavy rainfall in the Mathili area, an Odisha Disaster Rapid Action Force team has been kept on alert for rescue operation if required," the collector said.He added that if heavy rain resumed on Sunday night, people from the low-lying areas would be evacuated. Last week, the district administration had evacuated more than 300 villagers after rain flooded their homes.The India Meteorological Department (IMD) predicted heavy rainfall in some areas of the state in the following 24 hours. The rain will be triggered by a cyclonic circulation over northwest Bay of Bengal, off the West Bengal-Odisha coast."A low pressure area has formed over northwest Bay of Bengal. It will become more marked in the next 24 hours," the IMD-Bhubaneswar said in a statement.Places in Bargarh, Sambalpur, Koraput, Balangir, Ganjam, Subarnapur and Malkangiri received rain on Saturday night. On Sunday, rain lashed parts of Puri, Balasore , Angul and Koraput.The IMD warned of heavy to very heavy rainfall in one or two places over Malkangiri, Koraput, Kalahandi, Kandhamal, Rayagada, Ganjam, Gajapati, Puri, Nuapada, Nabarangpur, Sambalpur, Balasore, Keonjhar and Mayurbhanj districts on Monday. It also said extremely heavy rainfall was likely to occur in one or two places over Malkangiri, Koraput, Raygada, Ganjam and Gajapati districts under the influence of the low pressure.The Odisha government on Sunday wrote a letter to Kerala seeking assistance for natives of the state stranded there. Shyamal Kumar Das, officer on special duty (revenue and disaster management), wrote to the Kerala relief commissioner, asking him to provide "food, water and other necessities" to the 187 people from the state stranded in the floods.

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