Postman Manikandan K shows a parcel addressed to a man living in Ajvad, Wayanad, which he will no longer need to deliver.

“This man is dead. He was killed in the July 30 landslides. I knew him. There are more such parcels that we at this post office are not able to deliver for weeks now as the addressee is either dead or missing,” he says.

Shalini G, the in-charge postmaster of the Vellarmala post office in Chooralmala, keeps staring at the pile of parcels and packets that she is not able to get delivered since the facility was back on its feet on August 7.

The anguish of Shalini’s husband Velayudhan PT, also a postmaster in the nearby Mundakkai village, is unbearable as every day he gets to know about more and more friends and acquaintances who have died in the landslides exactly a month ago.

The couple’s 13-year-old, two-storeyed house in Chooralmala has been rendered unlivable by the landslides.

“Me, my husband and son were lucky to have escaped the disaster that night as it inundated the first floor of our house. We ran uphill and were later rescued,” Shalini says, casting a glance at the pile of undelivered and unclaimed parcels placed neatly on her table in the single-room post office.

A post office littered with parcels of the dead and missing and a special police unit deployed to stop “selfie tourists” and patrols to check thefts in abandoned houses are all that remain of Punchirimattam, Chooralmala and Mundakkai, the three villages in Kerala’s Wayanad that were wiped away by the landslides.

An 8km radius straddling the three villages was devastated by at least two massive landslides that hurtled down with ferocious volumes of water and debris around 2am on July 30 claiming more than 231 lives. According to official data, 218 human body parts have been found.

Kerala state highway no. 39, which leads to these picturesque villages of the hill district of Wayanad, bear testimony to the heart-wrenching tragedy as police vehicles, heavy earth movers, ambulances and rescue teams line up the stretch in anticipation of any emergency in view of the continuing downpour.

Houses — many damaged or partially crumbled and some intact — lie abandoned as the inhabitants have been moved by the government to public shelters and rented houses, while a few others have shifted to the homes of their relatives.

Some residents occasionally come to check on their houses with the hope of finding their belongings that are buried under mounds of slush that is riddled with huge rocks and tree trunks. The 10-day long rescue operation has ended with slim chances of finding more survivors, a civil defence official stationed in the area said.

The mud-splattered houses of residents in the three villages, schools and other buildings reflect a frozen frame of catastrophe with hanging half-cut pillars, muck pushed right up to the bedrooms, bikes and four-wheelers buried under slush, utensils, sofa seats, chairs, tables, toys, school bags, clothes and toothbrushes lying strewn all over the place.

A contingent of the Malabar Special Police, a unit of the Kerala police tasked to undertake specialised law and order duties, along with local cops, patrol these abandoned villages on foot to keep possible crimes at bay.

Officials say a few incidents of theft have been reported. There was an instance when Rs 4 lakh in cash was recovered from under the rubble.

At least four police pickets have been set up at the entry of the landslide-affected area to stop “selfie-seeking tourists” and curious onlookers who want to capture a slice of the disaster on their smartphones.

“Only the people who lived here are allowed to enter so that they can check on their houses. Tourists and other members of the public are not allowed in this area,” inspector Rajitkumar M said.

Another policeman at the temporary police control room being run from a single-room house says only those who have proof of identity are allowed to enter the villages along with their vehicle.

A revenue department team sitting at the “incident command centre” has been asked to check the credentials of those who claim they are locals but have lost their documents in the landslides, he said. Officials said a special camp was held here and most residents who lost their Aadhaar, ration and PAN cards and other vital documents have been given duplicate copies.

A team from the Kerala fire and rescue and National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) is also stationed in Chooralmala to keep an eye on the swollen rivulet that runs down the hills into these villages.

A senior district administration official said large hectares of cardamom, coffee, pepper, tea, coconut, areca nut and banana plantations have been damaged in the landslides.

PTI