Collapsed Bridge: Bride and Groom wait on the banks of flooded Jahlma even as farmers carry their harvests on their backs Photo: Govind Phurpa

“The sun was so hot, we knew the floods would be coming.” Says Jagdish ji, resident of Lindur village in the Lahaul Himalayas.

His home and fields are adjacent to a glacial stream called Jahlma Nallah which shoots from the Pir Panjal range to meet the Chenab River below. And just as he predicted, on the afternoon of 29th June 2026, like the past five years[1], Jahlma Nallah flooded and roared. In a matter of minutes, the thin flow transformed into a terrifying, brown debris-laden force. The sludge raced towards Chenab and nearly blocked the river by the brute force of water and debris it collected on its way. It cut off the connectivity of hundreds of villages.[2]

Continue reading “Flooding Under the Scorching Sun: The Unstudied Crisis of Himalayan Nallahs” →