The floods in southern India are said to be the worst in 100 years [AFP]
The worst floods to hit southern India in a century have made 2.5 million people homeless and left 250 dead.
At least five million people are crammed in temporary government shelters after heavy rains last week triggered flooding that swamped millions of acres of cropland.
"These are the worst floods in 100 years," said Dharmana Prasada Rao, Andhra Pradesh's minister for revenue and relief.
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Relief officials used helicopters and boats to drop off rations and plastic sheets to hundreds of marooned villagers in Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka, the worst-hit states.
Officials and relief agencies said flood victims – including about 2.5 million people from Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh who have lost their homes - were now sheltered in over 1,200 temporary camps.
On Monday, rescue workers used about 300,000 sandbags to fortify weakening embankments of the Krishna river that flows close to Vijayawada, a city of about a million people in Andhra Pradesh and an important trading centre.
More than 50,000 people were trapped by floodwaters near the city, according to The Times of India, with many villages along the bank under 2m of water.
Rescue workers had earlier moved more than 200,000 people living close to the river and an alert was raised in about 100 villages situated along it.
Officials said vast areas of agricultural land, including sugarcane and paddy fields, were under water.
Media reports quoted officials as saying that billion of dollars were needed for relief and reconstruction.
Two and a half million people have been displaced and over 250 people were killed following the heaviest flooding to hit southern India in a hundred years.

Karnataka was the state most heavily affected by the floods. R.V. Jagdish, a government spokesman, said that 172 deaths from the rains in the state were reported, and fifty thousand people are living in relief camps. The neighbouring state of Andhra Pradesh reported at least fifty flood-related deaths. 1.5 million people residing in 100 relief camps across that state, chief minister K. Rosaiah said.

Relief crews dispatched boats and helicopters to send rations to large numbers of villagers left stranded after torrential rains.

No less than five million people have been sent to temporary government shelter areas following the heavy rains, which had flooded millions of acres of cropland.

Ambrose Christy, the south zonal manager for anti-poverty group Caritas India, said that “we have never experience anything like this before. It is the worst flooding in 100 years. The situation could become even more severe as the rains get worst. If the Krishna River bursts its banks, millions more will be forced from their homes and a huge area of land will be underwater.”