Guwahati, August 16
Indian Air Force (IAF) helicopters have been pressed into action to rescue marooned people even as flash floods in Dhemaji district in eastern Assam inundated over 150 villages since yesterday.

Dhemaji Deputy Commissioner MS Manivannan said over 200 persons were rescued in the district by IAF choppers from the villages that were suddenly inundated due to flash floods of the Gai-nadi and several other smaller rivers yesterday. Several hundred people have taken shelter in five relief camps in the district so far.

The swirling Gai-nadi (Gai River) that flows down from Arunachal Pradesh all of a sudden changed course yesterday morning near Sisiborgaon and washed away several houses after damaging the NH-53 as well as the Rangiya-Murkongselek metre gauge railway track.

Eight members of a marooned family were atop a tree for over four hours until the tree along with the flood-hit were swept away by the strong currents.

While a team of the NDRF personnel tried hard to reach out to the marooned persons, but in vain. They were finally washed ashore, the official claimed, refuting initial reports about their death.

Incessant rains in Arunachal Pradesh and eastern Assam had sent several rivers in Dhemaji, Lakhimpur and Sonitpur overflowing in the past two days. In Dhemaji, the original course of the Gai River was abandoned and the river was flowing through paddy fields along the highway.

Swirling waters of the Brahmajan and Satrang overtopped NH-53 at two spots near Gohpur in Sonitur district in north Assam. Several villages have been inundated by the flood waters of the Brahmajan, Satrang, Kukurjan and Sessa since yesterday, an official source said.