Deadly flooding threatens rhinos in India’s Assam as six drown

Six rhinos are among at least 129 animals killed in severe flooding at one of India’s best-known wildlife reserves.

Devastating floods triggered by torrential rains over the past few weeks have led to growing concern for residents of Assam’s Kaziranga park, famous for its large population of rhinos.

Assam is battling its worst flooding since 2017, when more than 300 wild animals died at Kaziranga.

The greater one-horned rhinoceros , Rhinoceros unicornis , is found in just nine protected areas in Nepal and India, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature. In India, the species is listed under the “vulnerable” category.

In its annual “State of the Rhino” report released in September 2023, the International Rhino Foundation said the population of the greater one-horned rhino in India and Nepal had increased to more than 4,000.

There were only about 200 left in 1904.

Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma shared a picture of a stranded rhino calf in the park and said he had “instructed its immediate rescue”.

The floods “have affected humans and animals alike”, he said, “and Team Assam is working round the clock to aid everyone”.

Rescue workers have saved 96 animals so far, News18 reported.

Assam, along with eastern India, is flooded almost every year as rains swell the mighty Brahmaputra river and its tributaries.

But this year’s floods have been particularly severe, impacting over 2.1 million people across 28 districts of the state. At least 78 people have died.

The state’s disaster management agency said over 386,000 people were currently sheltering in 515 relief camps.

Although water levels in the Brahmaputra had fallen in recent days, the agency said, the flood situation was still severe.

The chief minister attributed the floods primarily to the breaching of eight embankments and heavy rains in the upstream state of Arunachal Pradesh. “No human intervention can stop it,” he said.

The Brahmaputra flows 1,280km through Assam before entering Bangladesh. It is one of 13 major rivers currently flowing above the danger level in northeast India.