Death toll crosses 2,000

India's brutal weeks-long heatwave has killed more than 2,000 people, authorities said yesterday, as day temperatures decreased at many places across the most affected Andhra Pradesh and Telangana states due to pre-monsoon showers on Friday, providing relief to people from the sweltering heat.

Hundreds of mainly poor people die at the height of summer every year in India, but this year's toll is the second highest in India's history and fifth most in recorded history globally, according to EM-DAT, an international disaster database.

The southern states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana -- which have so far borne the brunt of the heatwave -- accounted for 1,979 deaths. A further 17 people were killed in Orissa, eastern India, while nine people were reported dead elsewhere in the country, taking the death toll to 2,005.

A total of 2,541 people died in 1998 due to extreme temperatures, the highest figure in India's history, according to EM-DAT.

In Hyderabad, the capital of Andhra Pradesh, the temperature came down to 37 degrees Celsius from 43 in the evening. The city recorded 1 mm rainfall until 5.30pm, and weather officials said intermittent showers are in store over the weekend and next week.

Officials in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, meanwhile, launched public education campaigns to inform the most vulnerable on how to withstand the heat.

Yesterday, maximum temperatures across India hovered around 45 degrees Celsius, with forecasters in New Delhi warning that searing temperatures would continue next week across several states.