141 Suspected Heatstroke Deaths Reported in Odisha, 45 in last 24 Hrs

Bhubaneswar: The Special Relief Commissioner’s (SRC) office has confirmed 26 deaths due to sunstroke in Odisha.

According to the SRC’s office, as many as 141 alleged sunstroke deaths have been reported from various districts in Odisha during this summer. Out of them, so far 26 deaths have been confirmed to have happened due to sunstroke while eight others were caused by other reasons.

A total of 90 deaths due to suspected heatstroke were reported in the last 72 hours. Out of which, 20 have been confirmed as sunstroke deaths on the basis of postmortem and joint inquiry reports. It has been ascertained two cases were not due to sunstroke and the rest 68 allegations are under inquiry.

The majority of the alleged sunstroke deaths were reported from Balangir, Sambalpur, Jharsuguda, Keonjhar, Subarnapur, Sundargarh, and Balasore districts.

On Sunday, Odisha Chief Secretary Pradeep Kumar Jena and Special Relief Commissioner Satyabrata Sahu reviewed the heatwave situation with the 30 District Collectors. They directed the district administrations to implement the advisory on heatwaves and take precautionary measures.

The districts were also directed to ensure postmortem of every suspected sunstroke death for sanction of ex-gratia.

In addition, a joint inquiry by the local revenue officer (tehsildar) and the medical officer is mandatory to ascertain the exact cause each suspected sunstroke death.