Death toll hits 25 in India state as 40C heatwave drags on

India and Pakistan have been hit hard by a deadly heatwave

India’s western state of Maharashtra has recorded 25 deaths from heat stroke since late March, the highest toll in the past five years.

And more fatalities are forecasted as the nation swelters in temperatures over 40C.

Scientists have linked the early onset of an intense summer to climate change, and say more than a billion people in India and neighbouring Pakistan were in some way vulnerable to the extreme heat.

With cooling monsoon rains only expected next month and increasingly frequent power outages in some parts of India, even households that can afford air conditioners will have little respite over the next several weeks.

Many of the deaths in Maharashtra occurred in the more rural areas of India’s richest state.

"These are suspected heat stroke deaths," Pradeep Awate, a Maharashtra health official, told Reuters.

India is the world’s second-biggest wheat producer, but the heat is set to shrivel this year’s crop, after five consecutive years of record harvests.

A workers quenches his thirst as a heatwave continues to lash New Delhi (AP)

As power demand surges, generating companies are staring at massive shortages of coal and the government is pleading with them to step up imports.

This weekend Pakistan issued a heat warning after the hottest March in 61 years while in parts of neighbouring India schools were shut and streets deserted.

Pakistan’s federal minister for climate change, Sherry Rehman, urged the federal and provincial governments to take precautionary measures to manage the intense heatwave, which touched highs of 47C in parts of the country.

"South Asia, particularly India and Pakistan are faced with what has been a record-breaking heatwave. It started in early April and continues to leave the people gasping in whatever shade they find," Rehman said in a statement.

Temperatures were predicted to rise by 6 to 8 degrees Celsius above average temperatures after the hottest March on record since 1961, she said.