New Delhi, August 4 (RHC)-- The latest death toll in flooding from heavy monsoon rains in India has reached more than 180 people, while displacing more than 7 million people. According to local news reports, Indian rescue teams are searching for two buses carrying 22 passengers that were washed away on Wednesday in flood waters after a bridged collapse in western India.

In response to the incident, the government deployed 80 rescuers, including divers, to the area but their efforts were being hampered by heavy rains.

The torrential downpour has also reached havoc on the country’s wildlife, killing at least 17 rare one-horned rhinos dead due to the flooding of vast tracts of Assam's Kaziranga National Park. Environmental officials said that the park had 5-foot-high floodwaters in many areas, facing many of the park’s wildlife, to traverse a nearby highway to move to higher ground.

An estimated eighty per cent of Kaziranga National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is submerged under flood waters. The rains have also left devastation in neighboring Nepal, where it is believed that 84 people have died, with another 10 still missing.

Meanwhile, at least 42 people have died in the flooding in Bangladesh, while around 1.5 million people have been affected. According to an Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report released last year, India can expect greater intensity and frequency of extreme weather events in coming years, with changing rainfall patterns, heatwaves, and erratic spurts of floods and drought.