Flood Worsen in India Due to Chocked Riverbasins

Heavy Rainfalls Battered the Western Himalayas Last Week Due to a Clash Between Monsoon Currents and Winds from the Caspian Sea

The Srinagar weather station - in the summer capital of the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir - recorded 250 mm of rain between September3-6.

Theresultant floods-which have killed almost 400people in India and Pakistan and displaced tens of thousands more - were perhaps inevitable. But they would not have become so devastating if the riverbeds and lakebeds had not been raised by silt, while their banks were encroached upon by ill-plannedbuildings.

There are four reasons why the floods have caused so muchdamage:

• deforestation in the catchment areas of rivers - especially Jhelum, Chenab and Indus - and ofstreams;
• unplanned construction of buildings and roads, especially in the floodplains of the rivers and the banks of thelakes;
• rampant and unchecked dumping of garbage in the rivers andlakes;
• overuse of chemical fertilisers byfarmers.

Thesituation is identical in adjacent regions of Pakistan- which have been just as badly hit by the floods. Deforestation is particularly rampant in the Gilgit-Baltistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces ofPakistan.

With the death toll in thetwo countries nearing 400, authorities are understandably putting all their energies into the rescue of stranded residents, restoring communications networks and getting relief supplies into the valley. With parts of the Jammu-Srinagar road washed away, this process is going to take sometime.

The worry is, after the immediate rescue and relief work ends, it will be business as usual. In that case, what is now the worst flood in Kashmir in six decades may become the newnormal.

WithUttarakhand government apparentlyhaving learnt few lessons after the devastating floods in that Indian Himalayan state last year, it is not an idleworry.

Source: Eco-Business

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