OFFICIALS say nearly 300,000 people have been evacuated from flood-hit areas of Pakistan's Punjab province following the latest flood alerts by India.

The evacuations bring the total number of people displaced since last month to 1.3 million.

Floodwaters have submerged dozens of villages in Punjab’s Muzaffargarh district, after earlier inundating Narowal and Sialkot, both near the border with India.

Authorities are also struggling to divert overflowing rivers onto farmlands to protect major cities, as part of one of the largest rescue and relief operations in the history of Punjab, which straddles eastern Pakistan and north-western India.

Thousands of rescuers using boats are taking part in the relief and rescue operations, while the military has also been deployed to transport people and animals from inundated villages, said Arfan Ali Kathia, director general of Punjab’s Provincial Disaster Management Authority.

A new flood alert was shared with Pakistan by neighbouring India through diplomatic channels early on Wednesday, Kathia said. It was the second such alert in 24 hours following heavy rains and water releases from dams in India.

Kathia said the Ravi, Chenab and Sutlej rivers are all in high flood following torrential rains and upstream discharges.

Landslides and flooding have killed at least 29 people in India’s Punjab state, home to more than 30 million people.