India's monsoon season, which lasts from June to September, brings rain vital for the country's farmers but also often causes massive destruction.

This flooding, however, is different from the annual monsoon deluge.

Flood-affected people move to safer grounds through a flooded road in Madhepura town in India's eastern state of Bihar August 30, 2008. Indian authorities, hampered by heavy rain and damaged roads, were struggling on Saturday to provide aid to millions of displaced villagers in Bihar hit by the worst flooding in 50 years. [Agencies]

Apart from the roads, the vast plains have been turned into a massive lake, with only an occasional tree or rooftop breaking the surface.

The waters are deceptively placid in places but swirling and menacing in others where dozens of workers pile sandbags and rocks on the road embankments, trying to strengthen them and prevent these last vital links from being washed away.

Those who have made it to the few points of high ground consider themselves lucky. The government has some 900 boats carrying out rescue operations but they have not even penetrated some regions.

D. R. Ayub was trapped on the roof of his home for more than 10 days until he managed to get word to his brother-in-law who owns a boat.

"We did not see anything of the government," he said as he wearily clambered out the rescue boat, which he had shared with 100 others people and several goats. The boat was heading back to the village where about 1,000 more people were waiting, he said.

But not everyone wanted to leave their homes.

Nearby, a government worker was loading relief packets, each containing 5.5 pounds of rice, 9 ounces of sugar and a matchbox and a candle, into a boat along with 300 polyester sheets to use for shelter.

They were for people who were refusing to leave their homes, fearing looters, said the worker, Binod Senha.

The government says it has not yet been able to asses the extent of the devastation, which Prime Minister Manmohan Singh described as a national calamity.

"We will only be able to tell the extent after the water recedes," said Amrit. "But it is colossal."