Rivers Rise Again

Decades of silt, unchecked building, and shrinking wetlands leave the valley exposed to floods that keep returning.

- Peerzada Mohsin Shafi

The nightmare returned as the Jhelum swept into Kashmir's markets, traders threw up sandbags, and families rushed upstairs. In Jammu, a bridge collapsed, and in the Chenab Valley, cloudbursts cut off villages.

The scenes carried the same dread as September 2014, when floods submerged nearly a third of Srinagar and displaced half a million people.

Ten years on, the valley remains exposed to the same forces that once drowned it.

Hydrologists estimate that the Jhelum's carrying capacity has fallen by nearly a third over the past five decades. Silt has raised the riverbed by up to four feet in places, forcing floodwaters over embankments even during moderate rains.

From Sangam to Srinagar, once-broad channels have narrowed into fragile corridors.

The Flood Spill Channel, carved in 1903 to drain excess water from the Jhelum and protect Srinagar, has been reduced to a trickle. Designed to carry 17,000 cusecs of water, it now manages less than a third of that, clogged with debris and encroachments.

The valley's wetlands, once natural shock absorbers, are shrinking at alarming rates. A study by the Department of Remote Sensing at the University of Kashmir found that Hokersar, known as the “kidneys of Kashmir”, has lost nearly 70 percent of its area since the 1970s. Wular Lake, South Asia’s largest freshwater body, has shrunk by almost 27 square kilometers over the same period due to siltation and encroachment.