Family Appeals For Safe Return Of Newly-Married Odisha Couple Stuck In Sikkim

Cuttack: Family of a newly married couple from Cuttack, who are stuck in Sikkim after a cloudburst over Lhonak Lake in the early hours of Wednesday triggered flash floods, has appealed to Odisha government to ensure their safe return.

The couple, Dibyanshu Subudhiray (28) and his wife Seema (25), were on a seven-day trip to the Himalayan state with some of their friends. While Dibyanshu is a pharmacologist, Seema works in a private bank in Cuttack.

According to sources, they left on October 1 and were staying in a hotel in Gangtok. Finding their phone switch off on Wednesday morning, the family lodged a missing complaint at Choudwar police station here. They heaved a sigh of relief when Dibyanshu finally called them on Thursday and informed about being safe at a military camp. “They unable to return due to road and air connectivity issues. We appeal to the state and central governments to ensure their safe return,” Dibyanshu’s father Ranjan Subudhiray told the media.

The police here, on the other hand, have sought their call details record from the telecom service provider to be table to track their exact location.

Meanwhile, the toll in the flash floods has mounted to 21 while searches are still on for 103 missing people, including the 15 jawans. Bodies of seven jawan, including Saroj Kumar Das of Kendudhipa in Dhenkanal, have been recovered so far by Army and NDRF teams, which worked their way through slushy earth and fast flowing water in the Teesta river basin and downstream north Bengal.