More than 130 wild animals, including at least six rhinoceroses and over 110 deer, have perished in floods in the Kaziranga National Park in Assam in northeast India, according to news reports. The park, one of India’s more famous wildlife sanctuaries and home to the iconic one-horned rhinoceros, is facing its worst floods since 2017, when over 350 animals perished by drowning in the waters or being run over on roads passing through the park while trying to make their way to safer ground.
Earlier this year, the national park was in the news for recording the highest revenue collection in its 50 years of existence. Kaziranga is home to over 2,600 one-horned rhinoceroses, the world’s largest population of the animal, which was once on the brink of extinction. It also houses Royal Bengal tigers, elephants, wild water buffalo, and the endangered South Asian dolphins. It has been designated a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.
The floods in Assam have affected nearly 2.5 million people across 28 districts of the state, where at least 78 people have died in landslides and storms. Nine major rivers, including the Brahmaputra and the Barak, continue to flow above the danger mark in several places in the state.
Officials said nearly 100 animals, including a stranded rhino calf, were rescued and 25 of them are undergoing treatment while over 50 were released after being administered first aid. Twenty of the rescued animals died.
Assam’s Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma shared a video of the stranded rhino calf on the microblogging site X and claimed that it was rescued on his instructions. “The Assam floods have affected humans and animals alike, and Team Assam is working round the clock to aid everyone,” Biswa Sarma tweeted.
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