A 58-year-old flood-displaced man died in Bihar’s Saran district on Friday after he was allegedly struck by relief material dropped from an Indian Air Force (IAF) helicopter, while a woman and two children were injured in a separate incident during the same aerial relief operation, officials said.
A case has been registered and an investigation is under way. The tragedy unfolded against a severe flood emergency. Embankment breaches along the Gandak have inundated large parts of Saran. Ground efforts continue in parallel: multiple NDRF and SDRF teams are operating in the district, and tens of thousands of additional ration packets and polythene sheets are being moved in from neighbouring districts.
Officials reported roughly 170 villages across 33 panchayats in six blocks affected, impacting an estimated 3.32 lakh people and more than 75,000 families. More than 3,000 packets had already been air-dropped by the time of the incident, with further drops planned.
The villagers have given conflicting versions of the incident to the police, a police officer, requesting anonymity, said. “Some insisted the packets hit Singh directly; others suggested he may have suffered a heart attack as material landed nearby,” the officer said. The body was sent to Sadar Hospital for post-mortem examination, which authorities said would determine the precise cause of death.
