Guwahati: Thousands of people in Assam have moved to high ground after rivers burst their banks and swamped temporary homes.
They have been living in temporary homes since massive floods in 2004, officials said on Monday.
Low-lying areas of the oil-rich and tea-growing region were under water following two days of torrential rains.
Dhemaji district, 300 km east of Guwahati was worst hit.
"Some 15,000 people have moved to raised ground after floodwaters entered their temporary shelters," said a senior flood control official, Ananda Baruah.
In 2004, thousands of villagers were rehoused in makeshift homes after severe flooding killed about 200 people and made more than 12 million homeless.
Many are still living in the shelters, unable to go back home to land ruined by erosion and siltation during the floods. Most of these work as day labourers.
Floods wreak havoc in the state most of the years, leaving a trail of destruction and killing hundreds of people. But there was no flooding last year.
The annual monsoon rains, vital for India's economy, arrived a week earlier than usual in 2006, and lightning strikes and trees felled by heavy storms have already killed scores of people.
Heavy rains have been lashing parts of the eastern state of Orissa where lightning has killed at least 19 people over the past two days.
More than 700 people have been killed by lightning in the past three years in Orissa where cyclonic storms are common.
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