New Delhi, Dec. 26: When the mobiles beeped around 7 am today to announce an SMS, some officials in the disaster management division of the home ministry felt things could not be bad because of a quake in distant Indonesia.

When they reached office in an hour, the officials knew they were wrong.

Panic buttons had been pressed, an alert sounded and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh updated on the crisis along India?s southern and eastern coast. By afternoon, Union home minister Shivraj Patil put the toll tentatively at 1,000 but it was clear that the figure could rise.

Patil said Tamil Nadu was the ?worst affected?, Andhra Pradesh came next. The coastal areas of Bengal were also hit, but he had not been able to contact chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, according to the home ministry.

India was not the only one caught off guard by the tsunami ? a phenomenon common around Japan where it got its name. Thailand, Sri Lanka and Maldives were among the countries affected.

As he came on television, the Prime Minister promised to help the country?s neighbours to tide over the crisis.

Two ships had been dispatched with relief material to Colombo and Singh had made an offer of assistance to Thailand, Maldives and Indonesia.

?India stands ready to assist these friendly nations, should our help be required.?

Two Union ministers ? Mani Shankar Aiyar and Dayanidhi Maran ? were deputed to oversee relief and rescue work in Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Pondicherry and the Andamans.

Patil, who as home minister is responsible for coordinating relief and rescue missions, left for the affected districts for a first-hand assessment of the damage.

President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam expressed ?deep pain? over the loss of life and cancelled his Assam visit scheduled tomorrow in view of the tragedy.

By then, the crisis management group, chaired by cabinet secretary B.K. Chaturvedi, had already met and assessed the damage in the mainland on the basis of reports from state governments.

Over a three-hour meeting that started at 1 pm, the group of a dozen-odd department heads got its first comprehensive briefing from the meteorological departments and an update on the extent of the damage.

Tamil Nadu, where 600 people died in two districts alone, was clearly the worst hit. However, not much could be made out about the extent of damage in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Chaturvedi described the damage caused by the tsunamis as extensive but did not go into details.