Guwahati, July 5 (IANS) One person was killed and up to 400,000 have been displaced in flash floods triggered by heavy monsoon rains in Assam, officials said Sunday.
A government spokesperson said a tribal villager was drowned when his boat capsized late Saturday in South Asia’s biggest river island of Majuli in Jorhat district, about 320 km east of Assam’s main city of Guwahati.

“The elderly villager was on a country boat trying to get essentials for his family when it capsized. His body was recovered later,” a police official in Majuli said by telephone.

The current wave of flooding in the past one week has left about 400,000 people displaced in 500-odd villages in the four districts of Lakhimpur, Dhemaji, Jorhat and Nagaon.

“The situation continues to be grim and we have already put rescue teams in action,” said state Revenue and Rehabilitation Minister Bhumidhar Barman.

Most of the displaced people are were now lodged at makeshift shelters on raised embankments.

“We are providing food and medical support to the flood-hit people,” Barman said.

“We have also alerted civil, police, and paramilitary rescue teams in vulnerable areas,” he added.

There have been several breaches in embankments in Dhakhukhana area in the eastern Lakhimpur district. Besides, at least two dykes have been washed away in Majuli.

A Central Water Commission bulletin Sunday said the main Brahmaputra river and its tributaries were flowing above the danger level in at least 10 places and in full spate. An Assam government statement said a total land area of 3,000 hectares was affected.

The 2,906-km long Brahmaputra is one of Asia’s largest rivers. For its first 1,625 km it traverses through Tibet, the next 918 km in India, and the remaining 363 km through Bangladesh before converging into the Bay of Bengal.

Every year floods in Assam leave a trail of destruction, washing away villages, submerging paddy fields, drowning livestock and causing loss of human life and property.

In 2004, more than 200 people were killed in floods in Assam - the worst flooding in recent years.