The army has sent troops to India's remote northeast where monsoon-triggered floods have killed 11 people, displaced more than four million others and caused dozens of rare rhinos to flee for higher ground, authorities said Monday. The Assam state government requested the army's help and has put the state of 26 million people on maximum alert, said Bhumidhar Barman, a state official. «The number of people washed away or killed by drowning has risen to eleven in the past two days as more than four million others in 13 of the state's 27 districts have been hit by the floods,» Barman told The Associated Press. «We have also kept helicopters of the Indian Air Force ready to airdrop food and essentials that may become necessary anytime in certain parts,» Barman said. Up to 40 rare one-horned rhinos fled rising waters in Kaziranga National Park for higher ground, crossing a dangerous highway that runs along the reserve, located 145 miles east of state capital Gauhati, said Park Director S.N. Buragohain.
