Schools have reopened in the southern Indian city of Chennai (Madras) after a month of heavy rains and deadly floods.

Schools and colleges in the city and neighbouring districts of Tamil Nadu were ordered shut on 12 November.

At least 280 people died in the floods, which brought normal life to a standstill and closed Chennai's international airport for six days.

The rains, the heaviest in 100 years, were blamed on climate change.

With the rains stopping last week and water levels receding, the city has been limping back to normal. A major clean-up operation is under way.

"Normal life was restored in a week but we decided to open schools and colleges only today because we wanted all the institutions to be cleaned and washed before the students came in," Vikram Kapur, chief of the city's municipality told BBC Hindi's Imran Qureshi.

School examinations were postponed because of the floods, and even the city's university, one of the oldest in the country, had to put off semester examinations.

(BBC)