Don't go home yet, Indian state warns flood victims

PURNEA, India (Reuters) - Authorities battling a massive deluge in eastern India issued public warnings on Friday of more floods to come and asked villagers not to return home from temporary shelters yet.

Water levels receded slightly this week in some parts of Bihar state, which is facing its worst flooding in 50 years, but officials warned the flooding was a long way from improving.

Millions are now living on embankments, roads and in overcrowded camps in filthy conditions, making them extremely vulnerable to infections and water-borne diseases in the absence of drinking water, aid agencies say.

Many people were trying to return to salvage what was left of their homes, while tens of thousands were resisting evacuation efforts because they were afraid their homes would be looted.

Officials sent out radio appeals asking marooned villagers to evacuate and those in camps to stay put.

"The news of water receding should not be taken seriously at all," Pratyay Amrit, a senior disaster management official in Bihar, told Reuters. "We are still afraid there could be fresh flooding, so going back to the villages is not a good idea."

The floods have forced more than three million people from their homes, destroyed 100,000 hectares (250,000 acres) of farmland and killed at least 90 people.

Media reports say the toll may be much higher after the Kosi river, which originates in Nepal, burst a dam last month and unleashed huge amounts of water downstream in Bihar.

Indian air force pilots continued to drop packaged drinking water, bread and tarpaulin sheets for marooned villagers who waved from rooftops to attract attention.

Nitish Mishra, Bihar's disaster management minister, said 50,000-75,000 marooned people were resisting evacuation.

"It is not at all safe for those living in the villages and those planning to go back (from relief camps)," he told Reuters.

In Murliganj village in Purnea district, hundreds of villagers cheered rescue work by soldiers. The soldiers escorted a woman holding her new-born baby to hospital.

Angry villagers in one relief camp chased away a local politician, complaining that they were being served one bowl of gruel a day.

"The children are hungry. We want more food," a woman shouted.

Home to 90 million people, Bihar is one of India's poorest states and nearly 56 percent of its young children are malnourished, far higher than the 43 percent average nationally, UNICEF officials said.

(Editing by Krittivas Mukherjee and Paul Tait)