The flood situation in Assam has deteriorated with 15 districts reeling under its impact, as large parts of Dibru-Saikhowa and Kaziranga National Parks and Pobitora Wildlife Sanctuary submerged and five deaths were reported, official sources said today.
In Dibru-Saikhowa National Park in upper Assam’s Tinsukia district, two elephant calves were today swept away with the flood waters, submerging a major portion of the park famed for its endangered animal species and wet evergreen forests, sources said.
The surging waters of the swollen rain-fed Brahmaputra and its tributaries overran fresh areas affecting an estimated five lakh people in Dibrugarh, Sonitpur, Tinsukia, Golaghat, Morigaon, Dhemaji, Kamrup (Rural), Lakhimpur, Baksa, Barpeta, Jorhat, Nalbari, Sibsagar and Udalguri districts, the sources said.
In the third wave of floods during the current year, two persons, including a woman, were washed away in Dibrugarh district yesterday, one person drowned in the Demow river in Dhemaji district and two others in Tinsukia district’s Dhola area on September 13.
Incessant rains in Arunachal Pradesh, the Bhutan foothills and in the State for the last 15 days, have caused the Brahmaputra and its tributaries to rise above the danger level in most places and breach river dykes, embankments and overflow into human habitats and farm land, they said.
In Sonitpur district, the Army and National Disaster Relief Force (NDRF) were assisting the district administration in rescue and relief operations, pressing into service 10 special boats where road communication has been snapped by the deluge, district Deputy Commissioner Tapan Chandra Sarma.
The Tinsukia district administration has airlifted 100 marooned people in waterlogged Sadiya subdivision’s Paanch Mile area and Army helicopters were airdropping food items there.