The famished animals, which emerged from the surrounding forest in search of food, destroyed six homes in several villages near the border with Bangladesh.
More than 160 local peasant families fled before the thunderous onslaught and have now been sheltered in temporary camps. No human casualties were reported.
A wildlife expert with the Indian environment ministry said the stampede was a fairly common phenomenon.
A.K. Prashad said that elephants ordinarily emerge from their forest cover while crops are ripening in the fields, preferring the more nutritious rice on offer to what is available to them in the wild.
Most Indian elephants live in the northeast states of Meghalaya and Assam. However, widespread road construction in recent years, the spread of human settlements and deforestation have all conspired to deprive them of their natural habitats.
Specialists have estimated that a lack of food has forced more than 100 elephants to leave their home ranges in recent months and cross into Bangladesh. This year alone, they have trampled at least 13 peasants to death, and Bangladeshi authorities have vowed to shoot any elephant crossing over from India.
Environmental advocates and organizations have appealed to the Bangladeshi government to leave them alone.
