Chief minister Tarun Gogoi today undertook an aerial survey of Dibrugarh, Tinsukia, Dhemaji and Lakhimpur. He later held a review meeting at Mohanbari airport and sought a permanent solution to prevent flooding in Dibrugarh district.

In Kaziranga, Bagori range officer Pradipta Baruah told The Telegraph that the female rhino may have died by drowning but poachers severed the horn from the carcass.

"Preliminary investigations suggest that the rhino died a few days ago and since there were no bullet injuries on the carcass, the animal may have drowned in the floodwaters," he said.

"The carcass may have come floating from another location to the Baghmari chapori, on the periphery of the Bagori range," Baruah said.

This is the second rhino to have died in this year's floods at Kaziranga, habitat of more than 2,000 one-horned rhinos. A few days ago, a rhino calf was swept away by floodwaters at Kohora range.

The park is reeling under floods since August 30 with almost 80 per cent of it submerged by the Brahmaputra.

"The situation is improving slightly with water receding in some areas but most of the anti-poaching camps are inundated," said another forest official. Five such camps have been vacated because of the floods.

Honorary wildlife warden of the national park Uttam Saikia said six deer had been killed after being hit by speeding vehicles on NH-37 that bifurcates the national park. During floods, the animals cross the highway to move to the adjacent Karbi Anglong hills.

Park authorities have imposed Section 144, restricting the maximum speed of vehicles traversing through the area to 40km in the particular stretch of the highway that passes through the national park.

Saikia said a Guwahati-bound truck was seized for crossing the speed limit last night. "The truck hit a deer and it died," he said. He added that the water level had receded by about six inches at the park today and situation was likely to improve.

Several BSF outposts have been inundated, forcing security forces to shift to boats in Dhubri district since yesterday. Altogether, 30 of the 47 border outposts have been vacated.

"The BSF jawans manning the border in the riverine area have been facing the worst natural calamity and are now forced to operate from boats after the border outposts in the riverine area along Bangladesh in Dhubri district were submerged," a BSF official said in Dhubri.

Meanwhile, a delegation of Brahmaputra Control Demand Committee visited the affected areas in Dhubri district led by its president Suleman Haque and expressed serious concern.

In Guwahati, Assam State Disaster Management Authority said the rivers flowing above danger level are the Brahmaputra at Neematighat (Jorhat), Tezpur, Guwahati, Goalpara and Dhubri; Buri Dihing at Khowang (Dibrugarh); Disang at Nangalamaghat (Sivasagar); Dhansiri at Numaligarh; Jia Bharali at Sonitpur; Kopili at Kampur (Nagaon), Puthimari at Kamrup, Beki at Barpeta, Kushiyara at Karimganj.

As of today, 2,080 villages in 21 districts are reeling under floodwaters. Flood-affected people in Dhing constituency in central Assam roughed up their MLA Aminul Islam for visiting them in an air-conditioned vehicle.

Satya Basumatary, a businessman from Silapathar who helped the homeless with rice, potato and mosquito nets, alleged that local MLA Pradan Baruah had not even come to see the affected people.

Villagers alleged that food supplied to them was insufficient. They are facing severe potable water scarcity.