10/08/2025
_Flood Cycle of Despair: A Nation’s Reckoning_
SANGRAM SINGH RANYAL (WRITER , SOCIAL ACTIVISTS POONCH (J&K)
India's monsoon season, while vital for agriculture and water resources, has increasingly become synonymous with disaster. This summer’s deluges that devastated Dehradun, Himachal Pradesh, and vast swathes of the country have once again laid bare a painful truth: we are paying the price for our own missteps.
Recent flash floods in Uttarakhand’s Dharali region caused extensive destruction, with at least four lives lost, dozens missing, and entire highways, homes, and Army camps swept away . In parallel, Himachal Pradesh witnessed similar horror—monsoon rains triggered deadly landslides and floods, with death tolls ranging from 85 to 184 in recent weeks, massive infrastructural loss, and blocked roads numbering in the hundreds .
In the last decade alone, Uttarakhand has seen 705 fatalities due to flash floods and landslides—a grim testament to a growing trend fueled by climate instability . Meanwhile, experts argue that human interventions—deforestation, unregulated construction, rampant hydropower development, and dumping muck along riverbeds—have amplified the destructive potential of these natural events, transforming predictable monsoons into catastrophic deluges .
Climate change intensifies this cycle. A warmer atmosphere holds more water vapor—every 1 °C rise boosts moisture capacity by 7 %—enabling extreme downpours like cloudbursts. These intense localized rainfalls, often exceeding 100 mm/hour, are increasingly common in the Himalayas, triggering sudden, deadly floods .
This convergence of intensifying monsoons and environmental mismanagement reveals systemic fault lines. In Himachal, unchecked tourist-driven development and infrastructure projects have ignored fragile terrain realities. Four-lane highways carved through mountain slopes, unchecked cement plant expansions, and hydropower tunnels have destabilized entire ecosystems, with debris-laden tunnels acting as flood triggers during rains .
Yet, despite repeating this cycle annually, our response remains reactive. Policies lean toward post-disaster relief rather than robust prevention. Drainage systems, especially in cities, remain outdated, and early warning systems lag behind modern requirements . On a hopeful note, the NDMA has deployed expert teams to assess the situation in the Himalayas and plan more adaptive, resilient strategies .
Who is to blame?
The genesis of the crisis is multifaceted. Nature’s fury meets our disregard: warming climates, but also the reckless ambition that sacrifices ecological balance at the altar of short-term development. Governments, planners, and investors must shoulder their share. So must communities that ignore hazard zones and push for unsustainable tourism.
What must be done?
India needs a dual offensive: first, aggressive climate resilience—modernized infrastructure, early warning, upgraded planning sensitive to Himalayan ecology, restoration of natural buffers, and enforcement against illegal encroachments. Second, a paradigm shift in development: scientific, sustainable, and community-centered.
Let us invest in long-term adaptation, not endless recovery.
The monsoon will return. If this cycle of tragedy continues unchanged, it won’t just be nature that washes away our towns—it will be our future.
