[31st August 2026] OpED: The mountains have sounded a warning, we ignore it at our peril.

Question (2021, GS3): “Discuss about the vulnerability of India to earthquake-related hazards. Give examples including the salient features of major disasters caused by earthquakes in different parts of India during the last three decades Linkage: The GLOF avalanche was potentially triggered by a 4.4 magnitude earthquake, directly illustrating the complex, cascading nature of earthquake-related hazards in seismically active mountain systems.

Mentor Comment

Flash floods have swept down from the mountains on the Nepal Tibet border into Nepal’s Rasuwa district. A glacial lake outburst flood (GLOF) sent a massive avalanche of water and mud down the Lhende River about 20 km east of the Rasuwagadhi border crossing, sweeping away villages, settlements and a large number of people downstream. The avalanche may have been triggered by a 4.4 magnitude earthquake recorded in the area minutes earlier. At least six hydropower projects downstream were destroyed, costing Nepal 405 MW of capacity, which is 12 per cent of its national total. The tension is that the Himalaya has produced this exact sequence repeatedly, and hydropower schemes and hill tourism have expanded on the same valleys after each event. A second front has opened across the border, where China is building the Medog dam at the great bend of the Brahmaputra and hydrological information sharing with India has never been regular.

What is a glacial lake outburst flood?

1. How the lake forms: A mountain river upstream is blocked by a portion of a glacier breaking away or by an avalanche. The blockage impounds a lake behind it.
2. How the lake bursts: The loose banks of that lake give way under water pressure, and a huge volume of water and debris then hurtles downstream through narrow valleys.

What did the flood take out beyond the power projects?

1. The path of the surge: The floods spread south from Rasuwa into the Dhading, Gorkha and Nuwakot districts of Nepal, and the impact carries across the border into India. Chinese media reported similar loss of life and property on the Tibetan side, in Gyirong county.
2. Indian pilgrims caught in it: Over 160 Indian pilgrims are reported missing. The hotels and guest houses they were staying in were washed away in the flood.
3. A trade and pilgrimage artery closed: Rasuwagadhi is the most important border crossing between Nepal and Tibet for trade and for tourism, including pilgrim tours to Kailash Mansarovar. Cross border trade and traffic are likely to remain suspended for the foreseeable future.
4. The recovery horizon: Rebuilding the lost generating capacity may take several years, and it is a loss Nepal can ill afford.
5. India’s immediate response: India sent urgent medical and food supplies to Nepal. It also despatched specialised rescue teams.

How large is the hazard the Himalaya now carries?

1. Glacier area: There are 48,000 sq km of glaciers spread over the Himalaya, and another 18,000 sq km sit in the Karakoram.
2. Mapped lakes: Researchers have mapped over 5,000 glacial lakes in the Himalaya. About 500 of them are classified as hazardous or significantly hazardous.
3. Recorded events: There have been at least 388 recorded GLOF instances in the Himalaya Karakoram mountains, and their frequency has been increasing in recent years.
4. What these glaciers support: Himalayan glaciers are the source of the rivers that sustain the entire Indo-Gangetic plain, which is populated by over 500 million people.

Why has the record of past disasters not changed construction in the valleys?

1. Dharali, August 2025: A GLOF event at Dharali in Uttarakhand, on the route to Gangotri, caused large scale loss of life and property.
2. Kedarnath, 2013: The Kedarnath flash flood was caused by a combination of torrential rains and a GLOF at Chorabari lake to the north. The surge of flood waters and debris washed away towns and settlements along the highway to Gangotri.
3. The rules that followed it: There was talk of assessing and strictly observing the human carrying capacity of these remote pilgrimage places. No construction within 500 metres of the river banks was to be permitted thereafter.
4. What actually happened: Hotels and guest houses have mushroomed once again on the river banks. No lessons have been learnt from the earlier event.
5. The load on the shrine towns: During the pilgrimage season Kedarnath may see a daily turnover of 15,000 to 20,000 pilgrims.
6. Construction at extreme altitude: Prefabricated guest houses, restaurants and dhabas operate even at 18,000 feet, with gas cylinders transported back and forth for heating and cooking. There are no proper arrangements for waste management.
7. The direction policy is moving in: The Uttarakhand government is reportedly considering opening Badrinath and Kedarnath for pilgrimage the whole year round.

What has hydropower already lost to these events?

1. Teesta-III, October 2023: A GLOF from South Lhonak lake in Sikkim completely washed away the 1200 MW Teesta-III hydropower dam and power station.
2. Rishiganga, 2021: A sudden flash flood triggered by a glacial collapse in Chamoli in Uttarakhand wiped out the Rishiganga hydropower project. It also blocked the associated Chamoli tunnel.
3. The seismic overlay: Hydropower development continues apace in the Himalaya, which is a known active seismic zone, so the outburst risk and the earthquake risk compound each other.
4. The response to the evidence: Major hydropower projects continue to be pursued across the mountain zone, creating mounting risks to life and property, and those risks are being cynically ignored.

Why is the Medog dam a transboundary risk for India?

1. Scale of the project: China has begun constructing the gigantic Medog dam at the great bend of the Brahmaputra river just across the border. It is slated to deliver 300 billion kWh of power annually.
2. How large that is: The largest hydro project in existence anywhere in the world, the Gezhouba on the Yangzi River, is rated at 15.6 billion kWh of power annually.
3. The fault line under it: Chinese scientists have warned that the project sits very close to the Paizhen Fault, a major fracture in the Earth’s crust, which makes it vulnerable to seismic events. A major earthquake in the project vicinity could send a massive discharge of flood waters and debris into India’s Northeast.
4. The information gap: The sharing of information and early warning between India and China has never been regular. It has been subject to the state of their political relations.
5. The wider river geography: Several rivers rise on the Tibetan plateau and flow through Nepal and India. Flash floods on some of these cross border rivers have already caused large scale damage on the Indian side.

Challenges to GLOF risk management in the Himalaya

1. Warning systems are built for the wrong signal: A system designed to track the gradual movement of glacial water cannot register a sudden wall of debris. Eg. The Bhote Koshi warning system did not detect the surge that hit Rasuwa. Fix. Pair water level gauges with seismic and acoustic sensors that read mass movement rather than a change in river stage.
2. A hazard rating triggers no building restriction: Classifying a lake as hazardous carries no automatic consequence for what may be built below it. Eg. A 2021 study by scientists from IIT Roorkee, IISc Bengaluru and the universities of Dayton, Graz, Zurich and Geneva flagged instability around South Lhonak lake, and the lake burst two years later killing at least 50 people. Fix. Attach a mandatory downstream no build corridor to every lake a national risk index rates as high.
3. Clearance is granted one project at a time: A chain of dams on the same river is appraised as separate schemes, so the cumulative surge risk down the valley is never assessed. Eg. The Alaknanda and Bhagirathi basins in Uttarakhand carry dozens of projects on hydrologically connected rivers. Fix. Require a basin level cumulative impact assessment before any new project is cleared in an outburst exposed valley.
4. Monitoring authority is split across agencies: Glacier survey, weather forecasting and dam safety sit with different bodies, so no single office can order action on a lake that is filling. Eg. The National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) has itself proposed an integrated glacier monitoring authority coordinating the Geological Survey of India, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) and the Indian Space Research Organisation. Fix. Create that authority and give it the power to direct downstream evacuation.
5. Nothing tests a dam that is already built: Outburst assessments became mandatory for new dams only after the Sikkim event, and existing designs are under review rather than under obligation. Eg. The requirement followed the loss of a 1200 MW station rather than preceding it. Fix. Set a dated deadline for retrofitting or de-rating existing Himalayan dams that fail a surge simulation.

Conclusion

Because the lake, the fault and the dam sit in one country and the flood arrives in another, the operative change is the status of hydrological and glacier data, which must move on a fixed schedule under a standing arrangement rather than as a political gesture. The marker to watch is whether the Medog construction timetable is matched by a year round data sharing commitment to India, the only warning the Northeast would get.

Disaster Risk Reduction in India

1. What it covers: Disaster risk reduction cuts exposure and vulnerability through prevention, mitigation and preparedness, rather than through relief paid after an event.
2. Who runs it: The Ministry of Home Affairs coordinates disaster management through its Disaster Management Division. Response is primarily a State government responsibility.
3. The four fund pillars: The National Disaster Response Fund (NDRF) and State Disaster Response Fund (SDRF) finance relief. The National and State Disaster Mitigation Funds (NDMF and SDMF) finance risk reduction projects alone.
4. Scale of the commitment: The Fifteenth Finance Commission allocated Rs 2.28 lakh crore for 2021 to 2026 across preparedness, mitigation, response and reconstruction.

Laws and Rules Governing Disaster Risk Reduction

1. Disaster Management Act, 2005: Establishes structures and processes at the national, State, district and local levels.
2. Authorities created: The NDMA chaired by the Prime Minister, State Disaster Management Authorities chaired by the Chief Minister, and District Disaster Management Authorities headed by the District Collector.
3. Disaster Management (Amendment) Act, 2025: Modernises the 2005 framework for urban risk, climate extremes and data driven response.
4. Urban Disaster Management Authorities: States may set up city specific authorities in State capitals and municipal corporation cities.
5. Statutory databases: National and State disaster databases covering risk assessments, mitigation plans and real time data are now mandated.
6. Plan ownership shifts: The NDMA and State authorities now prepare the disaster plans, earlier a task of the National and State Executive Committees.

Government Initiatives for Disaster Risk Reduction

1. National GLOF Risk Mitigation Project: A Rs 150 crore project covering Arunachal Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Sikkim and Uttarakhand.
2. Central Water Commission lake monitoring: The Commission monitors 902 glacial lakes and has a Risk Indexing Framework to prioritise high risk ones.
3. Common Alerting Protocol based Integrated Alert System: A Rs 354.83 crore project delivering geo-targeted warnings through SMS, television, radio, sirens and satellites.
4. Mission Mausam (2024 to 2026): Strengthens weather forecasting and multi-hazard early warning, including for outburst related risks.

Key Facts about Disaster Risk Reduction

1. Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction (2015 to 2030): The global blueprint adopted at Sendai in Japan, carrying four priorities and seven global targets.
2. The United Nations custodian: The United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction anchors the agenda and runs the Sendai Framework Monitor.

Challenges in Disaster Risk Reduction

1. Mitigation stays funded far below response: The roughly 80:20 tilt in the fund architecture privileges relief spending over prevention. Eg. Under the mitigation fund in 2025-26 the High Level Committee approved Rs 507.37 crore for panchayat led community risk reduction, a fraction of what response draws. Fix. Set a floor share of the disaster corpus spendable only on early warning, retrofitting and nature based solutions.
2. India’s deadliest hazards are not notified disasters: Heatwaves and lightning sit outside the notified list, so States cannot draw relief for deaths from them. Eg. The Centre has not accepted the Sixteenth Finance Commission recommendation to notify them. Fix. Notify both with an IMD linked declaration trigger and a stated compensation protocol.
3. The urban authority created in 2025 barely exists: City specific authorities are a State mandate, and only one State has set one up. Eg. Karnataka constituted an urban authority for the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike. Fix. Fund the rollout centrally and fix a clear interface with the municipal corporation.
4. The local tier remains under-empowered: Panchayats and urban local bodies are the first responders yet hold neither trained staff nor untied funds. Eg. The Aapda Mitra volunteer scheme trains community responders but reaches a small share of vulnerable districts. Fix. Route a fixed share of the mitigation fund to the local body with a training and equipment condition.