Dhaka - At least 39 people have died and more than 2.6 million have been affected after monsoon floods engulfed vast areas of northern Bangladesh, officials said on Tuesday.
Many of the victims drowned while others were electrocuted, disaster management official Abdul Kuddus Bulbul told dpa. All of the dead came from the eight administrative districts most severely affected by the floods.
Homesteads and farmland in vast areas of 18 north and north-eastern districts have been submerged by the onrush of waters from rivers in neighbouring India, Bulbul added.
More than 350 000 people have been shifted to 1 558 temporary shelters, which were opened as water levels on major river basins including those of the Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna continued to rise, said Bulbul.
Relief and Disaster Management Minister Mofazzal Hossain Chowdhury said the government had sent out an adequate quantity of dry foods to feed the flood-affected people.
"We have allocated 2 541 tonnes of rice and more than 10 million taka (about R1.6 million) as emergency support for the flood victims," the minister said.
Train services between Dhaka and five northern districts - Dinajpur, Lalmonirhat, Kurigram, Thakurgaon and Panchagarh - have been suspended since Monday after railway tracks were submerged.
Engineers were working to restore the lines, Sabah Uddin Ahmed, a railway manager said.
More than 130 people were killed in June by landslides triggered by heavy rain in Bangladesh's hilly south-east.