On camel-drawn carts, bicycles and foot, ailing villagers are arriving at clinics for treatment in a malaria outbreak that has already killed at least 800 people.
Authorities estimate 70,000 people in a region just southwest of New Delhi are suffering from the mosquito-borne plague, spurred on by unusually heavy monsoon rains.Farmer Naseeruddin Ahmed lost two brothers to the deadly fever. He also lost his faith in modern medicine.
"I stopped taking medicines after the doctors couldn't save my brothers," Ahmed said.
Though the official death count is 800 since early September, officials say the toll is probably much higher, with many deaths among the poor going unreported.
More than 600 people have died in Gurgaon district alone, one of five districts in Haryana state hit by the epidemic, officials said.
Monsoon rains were heavier and lasted longer than normal this summer in the region, creating a breeding ground for the mosquitoes that spread the parasite that causes malaria. In addition, two dams burst in neighboring Rajasthan state and submerged nearly 12,000 acres of farmland, extending the breeding grounds.
Officials had hoped that once the monsoon rains ceased in mid-September, the mosquitoes that carry malaria would stop breeding. But now they say that because the weather had remained warmer than usual, the mosquitoes did not die off.