Nepal, April 2 -- Families across Parsa and Bara districts spent a long, hungry and cold night under an open sky after a severe rainstorm on Sunday destroyed most of their homes.

The homes destroyed were made of mud and stone with thatched roofs, which blew away in the fierce winds that accompanied the storm. Most of the residents were sitting down for dinner when the storm struck at 7.15pm on Sunday evening, forcing them to abandon their meals and hurriedly seek shelter.

"We were just about to eat our dinner when the walls of our house were pelted with heavy rain and gusts of wind," said Mahantha Ram, 62, of Chainpur in Parwanipur Rural Municipality. "There was a loud noise so I went out to check. A hot gust of wind enveloped me when I...