As many as 2,59,938 people took refuge in 227 temporary shelters in the capital and many of them are thinking of rebuilding their homes as floodwaters continued to recede slowly with water levels in rivers coming down.

This year's floods that echo the 1998 deluge have left millions of people without adequate food or clean drinking water and killed another 42 people, bringing the death count to 586 since July 10.

Official news agency BSS quoting the health department said about 10,000 people contracted diarrhoea yesterday with 715 in Dhaka that is reeling under stagnated filthy water.

The spate of flooding surged with new fury in eroding bank lines of receding rivers engulfing hundreds of houses and bazaars especially in the northwestern, central and southern districts.

The Brahmaputra-Jamuna and the Ganges-Padma continued to fall at all points and most rivers in the Meghna and the southeastern hill basins receded further.

Despite water recession, the Flood Warning Centre said, the water level in the Buriganga, Balu and Turag were flowing above danger marks yesterday, blocking the way of filthy waters out of the capital.

Our Sylhet correspondent said two minor children, 7-year-old Bilkis and her six-year-old brother Jafir, drowned in a village pond in Companyganj upazila yesterday morning.

The United Nations agencies are set to distribute relief in the coming days, as 10 million pound was granted by the UK Department for International Development (DFID), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) said in a press release.

Hospitals and temporary medical centres in flood-ravaged districts said they treated more than 100,000 patients over the last three weeks, but most deaths took place in remote areas that remained cut off by road and rail.

Although river levels were falling, water was receding at a slow rate and about 5,000 shelters across the country were still crowded with homeless flood victims.

The flooding inundated 40 of the 64 districts and left about 30 million people homeless or cut off. The cost of the damage to property and infrastructure was put at 6.6 billion dollars.

Germany in reaction to the flood situation has committed about Tk 17 million to several projects of humanitarian aid to the flood victims, the Embassy of Germany says in a press release.

Thousands of people struggle to reach food and drinking water -- many swimming across the floodwaters, while the UNDP said the severity of the situation prompted the UN agencies to join the relief campaign to fill the gaps, BSS said.

(BSS and AFP contributed to this report)