The task force will include secretaries of different ministries involved in the operations. ``Fernandes has also been authorised to co-opt any other minister to assist the task force,'' a Government spokesman said today.Fernandes cut short his six-day-long visit to the North-East to rush back to the Capital this afternoon. ``A proper assessment of the cyclone is still to be carried out and same is true for the number of casualties, relief measures and rehabilitation programmes,'' a Defence Ministry official said.

The ministries concerned include Agriculture, Defence, Railways, Surface Transport,Communications, Food and Civil Supplies and Health. ``Initial rescue and relief efforts were disjointed and uncoordinated. For the first few days the food that the Railways carried to Bhubaneshwar and Puri kept lying at the railway station. Perishable food items like bread were destroyed. And this is just a small instance. Therefore, a need was felt for better coordination between various agencies and ministries,'' he added.

In Bhubaneswar, the state government attributed the sudden doubling of the toll figure to delay in receiving information from remote areas. The toll had doubled when the district collectors collated the figures supplied by the tehsildars and block development officers and reported it to the government, said Special Relief commissioner D N Padhi.

In the worst-affected district of Jagatsinghpur alone, 6,383 deaths have been reported. Though Padhi said the government machinery had reached all the affected areas by Tuesday evening, there were few takers for this claim.