Unrelenting rains over the last week have inundated vast swathes of the country’s north-east region, exacerbated by runoff from heavy downpours across mountains in neighbouring India. Schools have been converted into makeshift shelters and troops have been deployed to evacuate households cut off from neighbouring communities as a result of rising waters. At least 59 people are known to have died in lightning strikes and landslides triggered by severe monsoon storms in India and Bangladesh. Can a good drainage system and proper littering help prevent floods ?

