Daytime cooking ban in IndiaAuthorities try to prevent accidental fires amid scorching temperatures that have destroyed crops and killed livestock
The eastern state of Bihar this week took the unprecedented step of
forbidding any cooking between 9am and 6pm, after accidental fires exacerbated by dry, hot and windy weather swept through shantytowns and thatched-roof houses in villages and killed 79 people. They included 10 children and five adults killed in a fire sparked during a Hindu prayer ceremony in Bihar’s Aurangabad district last week.
At least 300 people have died of heat-related illness this month, including 110 in the state of Orissa, 137 in Telangana and another 45 in Andhra Pradesh where
temperatures since the start of April have been hovering around 44C.
State meteorological official YK Reddy, predicted the situation would only get worse in May, traditionally the hottest month in India.
This is the second consecutive year southern India has suffered from a deadly heat wave, after some
2,500 people died in scorching temperatures last year.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/apr/30/daytime-cooking-ban-in-india-as-heatwave-claims-300-lives