case study on uttarakhand landslide joshimath

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4 January 2023

Joshimath: an Indian town with a serious landslide problem

Posted by Dave Petley

Joshimath is a town built in a beautiful setting on the side of a mountain in Chamoli District in Uttarakhand in northern India. Located in the same district as the 2021 Chamoli landslide and debris flow , this is an area with many slope stability issues. The town itself, situated at 30.553, 79.563, looks like this on Google Earth:-

Google Earth image of the town of Joshimath in northern India.

A rapid inspection of the site suggests a host of underlying landslide concerns with this slope. The large scoop missing from below the town in the centre right of the image is particularly intriguing for example. History tells us that slope problems are often greatly exacerbated by urbanisation, including disruption to the drainage, the uncontrolled discharge of water and undercutting of slopes.

Over the last few days, a number of media outlets in India have run stories about the scale of the landslide issues that are occurring at Joshimath, and the rate at which they are developing. For example, PKB News has quite a detailed story about the impacts of the slope failure . Their story notes the scale of the problem:

In Joshimath of Uttarakhand, people are in panic as cracks have appeared in around 559 houses. Due to the landslide, not only the houses, but also the roads along with the hotels and hospitals present there have been cracked.

The Times of India has a set of photographs of the catastrophic damage that is occurring to buildings in Josimath , whilst the PKB News story is illustrated with this image:-

Landslide damage in Joshimath, northern India. Image from PKB News.

Interestingly, the Times of India reports that an investigation in 1976 reported that the town is built upon an ancient landslide , and that the long term prognosis was poor.

Clearly there is an urgent need to investigate the hazards at Joshimath, and to develop a plan to manage the hazard. Reports indicate that a survey of damaged properties is under way, but this needs to be a part of a major larger investigation. Unfortunately, managing a landslide on this scale is likely to be very expensive.

It is of course worth noting as well that this is an area of significant seismic hazard, so the potential behaviour of these slopes during a major shake should also be factored in.

Posted in: landslide report 7 Comments/Trackbacks »

Dr Petley, did you see any media about the Snowpatch Spire rockfall in the BC Canada Bugaboo Mountains. Notable not from volume but suddenness and impacting many popular climb routes. No fatalities due to off season.

Quote from CBC article: “Drew Brayshaw, a climber and senior hydrologist and geoscientist with Statlu Environmental Consulting, said the rockfall affected about a dozen climbs. He estimates it was roughly 30,000 to 50,000 cubic metres in size.”

Unplanned urbanization with infrastructure to cater the needs of pilgrims,tourist all are responsible for the ills of not only of Joshimath but entire Himalaya.

The unprecedented subsidences in Joshimath have a long history and telltale indicators have been overlooked or ignored. The town is developed on old glacial drift deposits perched on the slopes and is incessantly undercut by the River Alaknanda resulting in the gradual erosion of the toe area. This erosion and underpinning are reflected in the form of cracks/fissures, and tilting of trees, buildings, poles, and pillars. There are documented reports on the cracks and their pattern all through the town which are exacerbated owing to urban pressure that the township is witnessing. Prima facie is not associated with tunnel construction or any other project undertaken as tunnel excavation is confined to the rock mass and may not be related to overlying overburdened deposits. It needs a thorough examination to dispel such doubts. As an immediate measure rehabilitation of affected communities is of utmost priority, then the demarcation of most critical areas, risk mapping, risk evaluation, and further repair or retrofit based on a sound geological assessment of the ground should be the top priority of the town. This will be a geological challenge requiring lot of cost. -Dr. Vinod K. Sharma, Expert Engineering Geologist, and Ex Dy.D.G.,GSI

Doctor, can one of the reasons for the increase in subsidence in the town be the flood disaster of last year? The large volume of water that Alaknanda and Dhauliganga received during that event could have sped up the erosion at the toe.

[Good point, thank you. If so I would expect that local people would have observed cracks starting to form lower on the slope in the first instance, and then this problem propagating upslope with time. It will be interesting to see if this happened. D]

About Joshimuth subsidence:

Remember the area as we have seen the segmented slope areas when we were going to the field trip to the TriHari Dam. We have checked the maps of the area of devastation and found that the urban areas are developing on the foothills, composed of heterogeneous Piedmont deposits. Geologically piedmont deposits are composed of very unpredictable mixed materials. The mass strength of the Piedmont material is very erratic and simple soil investigation is not enough to understand the failure mechanism. If it is happening in the winter like this during monsoon the Joshimath area would experience server damage and destruction. It is the beginning.

Precautions: Don’t tease Himalaya which is the youngest mountain in the world. It’s layers are not well consolidated yet. Keep Himalayas as our natural heritage. It is our watchman (Choukidar )

Really I agree with this report. It is not due to human intervention. It is natural happening. It is due to the the texture of the formation rocks called Piedmont rocks. Which is highly fragile and loose its strength very quickly with water causing subsidence that is actually occuring in Joshimath. This is beginning and pray for rainy season. Be prepared for below Joshimath.

Thank you Dr. Daya Shanker for a realistic interpretation of mobile geologic materials beneath the town. We look forward to see the people of the devasted area are moved to a safer place.

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The curse of joshimath

Known for being the winter abode of lord Badrinath, a resting place for tourists visiting the Valley of Flowers and Auli, and a staging ground for troops headed to the India-China de-facto border, Joshimath is more than just a quiet scenic town in the foothills of the Himalayas. But its scenic and geographical attributes are now the Uttarakhand town's biggest curse. The picturesque hills are literally moving and Joshimath is sinking under its own weight.

WHAT IS HAPPENING IN JOSHIMATH?

Spread over an area of 2,458 square kilometres, Joshimath is one of the six tehsils (blocks) in Uttarakhand's Chamoli district. It was all quiet and business as usual in the city until the last few months of 2022 when forces of nature began to push back and residents began to protest. Their homes -- and other manmade structures in the city -- started developing cracks. Sitting atop ancient glacial debris, the region had been a disaster waiting to happen, say geology experts.

case study on uttarakhand landslide joshimath

Joshimath is hit by a geological phenomenon known as land subsidence, which is a gradual settling, or sinking of the surface due to the removal of water, oil, natural gas, or mineral resources from the ground. According to the US-based National Ocean Services, subsidence is also triggered by natural events such as earthquakes, soil compaction, erosion, sinkhole formation, and an infusion of water to fine soils.

The town sits on the intersection of the Main Central Thrust 1, 2, and 3, the intra-crustal faultlines, where the Indian Plate has pushed under the Eurasian Plate along the Himalayas. The reactivation of these faultlines nearly 50-60 kilometres under the surface remains a big mystery.

Joshimath is a classic case of all these factors working together to create a recipe for disaster, as the government rolls up its sleeves to relocate people from the area. The Prime Minister’s Office said the safety of the people is the priority and has asked the state government to establish clear and continuous communication with the residents.

HOW DID WE REACH HERE?

Joshimath was always vulnerable to earthquakes as the region falls in the seismic zone V. What really made things worse is the weak foundation of the city. Sitting atop a glacial moraine, which are distinct ridges or mounds of debris that are laid down by a glacier, the town's foundation has no solid rocks.

Every structure needs a strong foundation, but Joshimath, which houses over 20,000 people, apart from the heavy tourist influx, has none. The debris has angular sediments, which are worse than river-deposited sediments. These sediments have voids, making them extremely unstable, geologically.

This unstable foundation, when burdened with heavy construction in the region, began caving by centimetres in the beginning. In the last several decades a boom in construction has made this region extremely vulnerable and susceptible to major land deformation.

WHY HAS CONSTRUCTION GONE UP?

Experts blame the rapid rise in construction activities in the area to the widening of the Char Dham Yatra road and the National Highway 7, which runs through the town taking tourists and cargo to the holy shrine of Badrinath every year. When Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Kedarnath and Badrinath in October last year, he joined a record number of 41 lakh pilgrims that thronged the shrine that year.

The widening of the road was not just a big contributor, but also led to more and more hotels springing up in and around Joshimath. Dr. Bahadur Singh Kotila of Kumaon University said that the roads in the geologically sensitive region should have been seven metres wide, but the government widened the roads to 12 metres, which led to more and more cleaning of the hills. This made the already ecologically sensitive region highly vulnerable to landslides as the top layer was cleaned for the road construction.

Locals also blame NTPC Limited’s 4×130 megawatt Tapovan Vishnugad hydel project for the situation -- a 12-kilometre tunnel has been carved into the hill. NTPC has denied allegations, saying that the tunnel does not pass under Joshimath town.

NATURE PLAYS THE BRUTE FORCE

The land subsidence was also triggered by an incessant spell of rain in the region in the last few years, which deposited more water on the surface. However, due to the unavailability of solid rocks underneath, the water seeped into the soil and loosened it from within. With the top surface of the soil already gone due to intense construction, the region has remained on the edge.

That is not all. In the last decade, the ridge that houses Joshimath has been traversed by running streams with a high gradient from Vishnuprayag, a confluence of the Dhauliganga and the Alaknanda rivers. The confluence has survived two big glacial and cloud outbursts that deposited heavy sediments causing major erosion in the region. "The outbursts brought debris worth 10,000 houses in one day, which made things worse for Joshimath," Dr. Kotlia adds.

JOSHIMATH NOT ALONE

The geological developments underway in Joshimath should be a case study for every town planner working in the hills. The factors at play in Joshimath are also found in other cities such as Nainital, Champawat, and Uttarkashi. All these cities are witnessing rampant construction, deforestation, population boom, and poor civic management. The only silver lining is that they are not on top of ancient glacial debris.

Nature has its own way of claiming its resources. Government, civil bodies, and citizens need to factor in these parameters when developing new cities.

Story : Sibu Tripathi

Illustrator : Vani Gupta

Image source : PTI, AFP

UI Developers : Vishal Rathour, Mohd. Naeem Khan

Uncontrolled Construction, Ignored Warnings: How Joshimath Sank

Though experts suggested that heavy construction should be prevented in the area more than four decades ago, governments have pushed through a hydel project and an ambitious yet controversial highway project in the region.

Joshimath in Uttarakhand. Photo: christian0702/Flickr. CC BY-2.0.

Cracks on the walls of houses. Fields and roads splitting open, some oozing brown, muddy water. There’s much that residents of Joshimath, a hill town in the north Indian state of Uttarakhand, have had to contend with for almost a year now. Their town is sinking.

On January 8, authorities listed the area as a landslide and land subsidence-hit area. As of January 9, 678 buildings – including houses – had developed cracks, and authorities evacuated more than 80 families from their homes. Cracks have also emerged in homes in nearby towns such as Raini and Karnaprayag .

These towns are situated in a fragile, mountainous region, near where several developmental projects are currently underway.

Residents of Joshimath blame the excavation work being undertaken as part of the construction of the Tapovan Vishnugad hydel power project – a 520 megawatt dam – as one cause for the sinking of their town. The construction of the Char Dham project – an ambitious 900 km-long all weather road through the state to promote religious tourism – is also a cause, according to experts.

Governments have pushed such developmental projects through despite reports, even more than 40 years ago, warning that heavy construction in the area should be restricted. Along with exacerbating climate change, the situation does not bode well for the region, scientists said, adding that while development is necessary it cannot come at such environmental or human costs.

The sinking of Joshimath

The hill town of Joshimath rests at around 1,875 metres above sea level, in the northwestern district of Chamoli in Uttarakhand. The town is important in many ways: it is the gateway to trekking routes (in the Himalaya mountain range), holy sites (such as Badrinath that are part of Hindu pilgrimage routes like the Char Dham circuit), and is also of strategic importance for access to parts of the Indo-China border.

Buildings burgeoned in Joshimath to meet all these needs, said Kavita Upadhyay , a water policy expert and researcher.

For residents of Joshimath, the first week of the new year opened to cracks emerging on roads and the walls of houses. Residents had been observing such cracks since February last year, after the flash floods that claimed more than 200 lives, said Upadhyay. But in the first few days of January this year, it became impossible to ignore.

In addition to confirming that Joshimath was sinking and that 678 buildings had cracks, authorities have now said that 600 more families will also to be moved to safer locations temporarily; demolition of buildings that have developed numerous cracks has also begun and two hotels are the first that will be razed to the ground.

But how does a hill town sink?

Joshimath is a landslide-prone zone. A 2007 study that mapped landslide hazard areas in the Joshimath–Badrinath road corridor found that Joshimath town was one of the most hazardous landslide-prone places in the area. In fact, as long ago as the 1970s, frequent landslides in the Joshimath area worried residents. The government constituted a committee under M.C. Mishra in 1976 to investigate the issue and recommend both short-term and long-term actions.

The report by the Committee, which The Wire accessed, noted that the town of Joshimath is situated where it should ideally never be: on an “ancient landslide”, a mixture of sand and stone. Thus, surface water – from rains or snow melts – can percolate into the loose soil and destabilise the land, resulting in landslides, it noted.

Joshimath in Uttarakhand. Photo: Flickr/christian0702 (CC BY 2.0)

This movement of earth in the subsurface can cause the land to settle down, or ‘sink’ – a phenomenon called land subsidence. Studies show that the extraction of ground water can also cause subsidence. Heavy construction activities such as blasting and underground tunnelling (which, as per residents, currently occur in the landscape as part of the ongoing Tapovan-Vishnugad hydel power project) can aggravate the situation.

In fact, “vibrations produced by blasting and heavy traffic will also lead [to] disequilibrium in natural factors”, the 1976 Mishra report noted.

Also read: For Seven Hydropower Projects in Uttarakhand, Environment Ministry Twists Facts

Construction and infrastructure development

Joshimath residents attribute the cracks that have emerged on their lands and houses over the past year to the ongoing excavations for the construction of the Tapovan Vishnugad project nearby. The Tapovan Vishnugad project is a 520-megawatt hydropower dam across the Alaknanda river in Uttarakhand. In February 2021, 139 workers at the dam were among the many who lost their lives to a flash flood upstream of Joshimath.

“We have been repeatedly warning authorities about the irreparable damage caused due to several tunnel and hydropower projects in and around Joshimath and other parts of Uttarakhand,” said Atul Sati, a local environmental activist. “However, our voices were blatantly ignored and our worst nightmare has come true today. The entire responsibility of Joshimath caving in is on NTPC’s Tapovan Vishnugad Hydro Power Project.”

However, the NTPC has washed its hand clean of any link between its tunnelling activities for the project and land subsidence in Joshimath. In a statement put out on January 5, the company said that the tunnel being excavated for the hydel power project does not pass under the town, and is not linked to the cracks emerging across the town in any way.

Thus spake NTPC, absolving itself of all the destruction it has caused in and around Joshimath. Please see this thread to understand a dam company's role in destroying the area, and how the govt too is involved in pushing for disastrous projects. pic.twitter.com/imI4h8AFBv — Kavita Upadhyay (@Upadhyay_Cavita) January 7, 2023

But scientist Anjal Prakash, Research Director and Adjunct Associate Professor at the Bharti Institute of Public Policy and Indian School of Business, also attributes the disaster to the project.

“I am very much convinced that the Joshimath caving incident is caused by the hydro power project which has been operational in building the tunnel and was the major cause of concern for the residents,” he said. “It has shown that water which has gushed out is from a fractured zone which has been punctured by the tunnel that has been leading to the devastating situation that we are in today.”

Unplanned infrastructure development is a problem in the Himalayas which are a fragile ecosystem, he said. “The return investment cost in hydropower projects is very less when compared to the cost associated with environmental and ecological damage. Joshimath is a clear example of what one should not do in the Himalayas.”

There are several issues revolving around the sinking of Joshimath, said Upadhyay. One of course is the rampant construction activities in Joshimath town to support the influx and needs of tourists, pilgrims and armed personnel. Another issue is the lack of a proper drainage system for waste water and sewage within the town, said Upadhyay.

“Almost 90% of the town’s population is not connected to the existing drainage system and have to rely on soak pits,” she said. The sewage percolates to the ground and pushes soil sediments further below and can be another reason for subsidence, she added.

The lack of proper drainage facilities accounts for landslides, the 1976 Mishra report had also noted. Soak pits – which are deep pits in the soil for sewage disposal – can lead to water seepage and soil erosion. Incidentally, the report called for a “pucca drain system” as being a “vital necessity”.

Outside the town, bigger construction projects such as the hydel power and Char Dham projects are also responsible, Upadhyay added. Construction of the former that included underground tunnelling led to the accidental puncture of an underground aquifer in 2009, she said. As per one estimate , the water discharge was around 700-800 litres per second; even after a month, the aquifer hadn’t not dried up. According to Upadhyay, locals say that groundwater levels have reduced over time, and water scarcity is a concern.

Also read: Char Dham: How Much Will Wider, Landslide-Prone Roads in Uttarakhand Serve National Security?

Warnings and disasters, overs decades, ignored

The construction of tunnels for the hydro power projects is being done through blasting and this creates local earthquake tremors, shakes debris above rocks and again causes cracks, said Y. P. Sundriyal, Head of Department, Geology, HNB Garhwal University.

“Government has not learnt anything from the disasters of 2013- Kedarnath floods and 2021-Rishi Ganga flash flooding. The Himalayas is a very fragile ecosystem. Most parts of Uttarakhand are either located in seismic zone V or IV which are prone to earthquakes.”

Though the report of the Mishra Committee was clear, its recommendations and warnings have fallen on deaf ears for nearly 50 years now. One of the main recommendations of the report was to ensure that no tree be felled in the landslide area. Another was to place restrictions on “heavy construction work” in the area.

However, governments have pushed through several projects involving such “heavy construction” and felling trees without heeding these warnings. Construction to build the Char Dham project, for instance, involves widening an existing national highway to build all-weather roads of width of 12 to 14 metres with paved shoulders. The 900-km road project which aims to provide all-weather connectivity to four holy towns including Kedarnath and Badrinath in Uttarakhand has increased the vulnerability of the state to disasters, led to loss of forests, blockage of streams with muck and slope instability, Ravi Chopra, former chairman of a high powered committee that was appointed to study the impacts of the project and make recommendations, had told Hindustan Times .

A view shows a damaged barrage after a part of a glacier broke away causing glacial flood in Chormi village in Tapovan, in Uttarakhand, India, February 7, 2021. Photo: Reuters/Stringer

According to Upadhyay, drilling and use of explosives for the construction of the Helang-Marwari bypass road that falls under the Char Dham highway has destabilised the town, making it more prone to landslides.

The Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change also went so far as to misrepresent facts to push for seven hydropower projects – including the Tapovan-Vishnugad hydel power project – in Uttarakhand, reported Upadhyay in The Wire in October 2021.

There are also no studies on the impacts of construction within town or those caused by the hydel power project on land, said Upadhyay. In the case of the hydel project, the environment impact assessment was also conducted by a private entity and not the Geological Survey of India despite it being located in such a seismically sensitive zone, she added.

Also read: By Dismissing Petition on Chamoli Floods, Uttarakhand HC Ignored Environmental Concerns

Peoples’ worst fears seem to be coming true: the cracks haven’t stopped at Joshimath. Similar phenomena are unraveling at several other towns in the area too, such as Raini and Karnaprayag. After residents noticed cracks in their buildings, a state government report in 2021 had warned that subsidence was an issue in the village of Raini, just around 20 km from Joshimath. However, no relocation or rehabilitation has been initiated so far, reported The Indian Express . Other towns in the landscape including Nainital will also soon face such concerns, experts told Down to Earth .

Local environment activist Sati of Joshimath has several demands of the government. One is to stall the NTPC-run Tapovan Vishungad hydel project immediately. Others include closing the Char Dham all-weather road (Haleng-Marwari Bypass), implementing the NTPC’s pact that insures houses, and developing a committee to rehabilitate affected people of Joshimath within a set time frame.

Planning is crucial as climate change also compounds the existing concerns, according to scientists Anjal Prakash and Sundriyal.

Climate change is a force multiplier and its manifestation in the hilly states of India has been unprecedented, said Prakash. Over the last two years, Uttarakhand has witnessed numerous climate risk events such as high rainfall events triggering landslides. We need to understand that these areas are very fragile and small changes or disturbances in the ecosystem will lead to “grave disasters”, which is what is happening in Joshimath, said Prakash.

“Joshimath is a very grave reminder that we are messing up with our environment to an extent that is irreversible.”

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Joshimath Land Subsidence

Joshimath in Uttarakhand had experienced an enormous landslide-like incidence leading to the development of various cracks. This topic has been in the news and hence assumes importance for the UPSC Exam , especially in the disaster management, geography, and environment & ecology segments.

What is the Joshimath Issue?

Joshimath (also called Jyotirmath), located in the Chamoli district of the Himalayan state of Uttarakhand, is located in seismic zone five and bound by two regional thrusts: Vaikrita in the north and Munsiari in the south.

The 1991 and 1999 earthquakes proved that the area is susceptible to earthquakes .
Scientists from the Indian Institute of Remote Sensing, Dehradun, observed that Joshimath and the surrounding areas have been sinking at a rate of 6.5 cm (2.5 inches) per year based on satellite data from July 2020 to March 2022. Their findings correlate well with the base erosion of the Joshimath slope along the Alaknanda river.
The city is located at an altitude of approximately 1875 m in the Middle Himalayas. It is also an important tourist and religious site, being close to the holy shrine of Badrinath, the Valley of Flowers National Park and Shri Hemkund Sahib, a holy place for Sikhism.

Reasons for Joshimath Crisis

The residents of Joshimath are alarmed over the unprecedented number of cracks appearing on roads, and commercial and residential buildings. People have been asked to vacate following fears of landslide and imminent disaster. Authorities have declared Joshimath a landslide and subsidence-hit zone.

Experts have pointed out that Joshimath city has been built on an ancient landslide material meaning it rests on a deposit of sand and stone, not rock , which doesn’t have high load-bearing capacity. This makes the area extremely vulnerable to ever-burgeoning infrastructure and population.
Unplanned and unauthorised construction has led to the blocking of the natural flow of water, which eventually results in frequent landslides.
The construction of NTPC’s Tapovan Vishnugad Hydro Power Project is also seen as one of the reasons for the incident. It was found that the tunnel had water seepage from a punctured aquifer, leading to the drying of water sources in Joshimath.
It may also be the result of the reactivation of a geographic fault — defined as a fracture or zone of fractures between two blocks of rock — where the Indian Plate has pushed under the Eurasian Plate along the Himalayas.

What is Land Subsidence?

Land subsidence is the sinking of the ground because of underground material movement. Subsidence can be caused by gradual settling or sudden sinking of the Earth’s surface (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA, USA)). The causes for subsidence generally are:

Natural causes – earthquakes, glacial isostatic adjustment, soil compaction, erosion, sinkhole formation, etc.
Resource extraction – extracting resources such as oil, water, minerals, natural gas, etc. from the ground by mining, fracking or pumping.
Construction of infrastructure – excess infrastructure load above the carrying capacity of the soil.

Mishra Committee (1976) Recommendation

This was a committee appointed in 1976, to look into why Joshimath is experiencing a sink. This committee made various recommendations in this regard:

In the slip zone, no new construction should be undertaken. Construction should only be permitted once the site’s stability has been assessed, and such regions should be appropriately investigated before being delineated.
No trees should be chopped down within landslide-prone sites, nor should boulders be removed by excavating or blasting to repair roads or perform any other building activity.
The region between Marwari (most affected during the recent incident) and Joshimath, below the Joshimath Reserve Forest, and in the cantonment should all undergo extensive planting.
It was also highlighted that there should be a complete restriction on gathering building material within a radius of 3 to 5 kilometres of the Joshimath township.

Seismic mapping in India:

Image source – Maps of India.com

The National Centre for Seismology under the Ministry of Earth Sciences is the nodal agency of the Government of India (GoI), for monitoring earthquakes in and around the country.
Zone V is seismically the most active region.
Zone II is the least.
11% of the country falls in zone V, 18% in zone IV, 30% in zone III and the remaining in zone II.

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Joshimath crisis: How Uttarakhand ignored repeated warnings for over 45 years

The 1976 Mishra Commission report had called for a ban on heavy construction around Joshimath. The warning was majorly ignored for the ‘sinking’ town of Uttarakhand which has seen an influx of tourists and also has many hydroelectric power projects in the making

The ‘sinking’ town of Joshimath, located in the border district of Chamoli, has been declared a disaster-prone area amid a rise in land subsidence, the Uttarakhand authorities said on Monday (9 January).

Since meters-long and over one-foot-wide cracks started appearing in houses, temples and other buildings in Joshimath last week, as many as 82 families have been shifted to 16 temporary shelters, as per a Times of India (TOI) report.

As many as 678 residences have been affected by subsidence, with an eight-member expert panel recommending demolishing the most damaged homes and relocating people at risk, the report added.

Moreover, all construction work related to NTPC’s Tapovan Vishnugad Hydroelectric Project, Ho Hare Helang bypass by the Border Roads Organisation (BRO) and projects undertaken by the Joshimath Municipality have been banned in the town till further orders.

Experts say warnings about the current situation in Joshimath were issued long ago.

Were early warnings on Joshimath ignored by governments, which has led to the current crisis? Why residents are blaming NTPC’s Tapovan Vishnugad Hydro Power Project for the incident? Let’s take a closer look.

Were early warnings ignored?

Joshimath, the small Himalayan mountain town, was built on the debris of a landslide triggered by a tremor over a century back, as per BBC.

Located on the middle slope of a hill, Joshimath falls in an earthquake-prone zone.

In a significant finding, the Mishra Commission report of 1976 revealed that the town was located in an ancient landslide zone, which means the area does not have a high load-bearing capacity.

The report also cautioned against “unplanned development in this area, and identified the natural vulnerabilities”, adding that the dearth of adequate drainage facilities was causing landslides.

“Joshimath was established by the Katyuri dynasty in the 11th and 12th Centuries. Joshimath is situated in the middle of two drainages - AT Company Nala and Singhdhar Nala,” Dr Manish Mehta, a geologist at Dehradun’s Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology, told India Today TV.

“Joshimath is built on a loose unconsolidated surface. The material beneath is soil and debris. The presence of clay suggests that there must have been a glacier many many years ago, in Joshimath,” he added.

Earlier, a 2006 report by another scientist of Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology, Dr Swapnamita Vaideswaran, revealed the soil of Joshimath might have been loosened due to seepage from streams uphill.

Environmentalist Chandi Prasad Bhatt has hit out at successive governments for failing to act on warnings by experts on probable disasters in Joshimath and adjoining areas.

“Failure of successive governments to act on expert warnings seems to be at the root of the Joshimath crisis,” he was quoted as saying by PTI news agency.

Bhatt, who is connected with the Chipko Movement, said “a detailed zonation mapping of the Himalayas in Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh, warning of the lurking dangers in Joshimath, had been submitted to the state government more than two decades ago”.

As per Bhatt, a study – using remote sensing and Geographic Information System (GIS) – conducted by 12 leading scientific organisations of the country including the National Remote Sensing Agency (NRSA) had submitted a report to the Uttarakhand government in 2001.

As per the report, over 99 per cent of the mapped area of Joshimath was landslide-prone in varying degrees.

Based on this report, a meeting was held between experts and senior administrative officials where it was decided to adopt safety measures, but no actions were taken, Bhatt told PTI.

ALSO READ : Why Uttarakhand’s Joshimath town is ‘sinking’

NTPC’s project under scanner

The Mishra Commission report had called for a ban on heavy construction around Joshimath .

“Joshimath is not suitable for a township,” the government study had warned.

However, the alert was not heeded as Joshimath has become the gateway for thousands of pilgrims bound for Badrinath and Hemkunt Sahib shrines, as well as attracting tourists heading to Auli.

Experts believe unplanned construction, over-population, hydro-power activities and obstruction of the natural flow of water could have led to the present disaster in Joshimath, as per Indian Express.

Locals in the town blame the 520 MW Tapovan-Vishnugad project on the Dhauliganga river for the land subsidence.

Geologists MPS Bisht and Piyoosh Rautela wrote in a 2010 paper published in Current Science , that the tunnel of the NTPC’s hydropower project traverses “all through the geologically fragile area below Joshimath”, BBC reported.

The residents allege the tunnel had water seepage “from a punctured aquifer, leading to the drying of water sources in Joshimath”, which experts say could be one of the reasons for the sinking of land, reported Indian Express.

Local environmental activist Atul Satti told news agency IANS that they have consistently raised alarm about the “irreparable damage” caused by multiple tunnel and hydropower projects in Joshimath and other regions of Uttarakhand, but their voices were “blatantly ignored”.

“The entire responsibility of Joshimath caving in is on NTPC’s Tapovan Vishnugad Hydro Power Project. “Continuous blasting in the tunnels has shaken the foundation of our town. We demand instant action from the government that must include immediate stalling of the NTPC project, closure of the Chardham all-weather road (Haleng-Marwari Bypass), implementation of NTPC’s pact that ensures houses, setting a committee for rehabilitation of Joshimath within a set timeframe,” Satti was quoted as saying by the news agency.

Meanwhile, NTPC has denied the allegations and said in a statement: “The tunnel built by NTPC does not pass under Joshimath town. This tunnel is dug by a tunnel boring machine (TBM) and no blasting is being carried out presently”, Indian Express reported.

With inputs from agencies

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Joshimath sinking: Eight more areas at risk of land subsidence in Uttarakhand

A man looks at cracks that appeared in a PWD Guest House, in a land subsidence-affected area in Joshimath, Jan. 16, 2023. (Photo | PTI)

JOSHIMATH: With cracks running houses and the city's infrastructure, the scope for further incidents of land subsidence in Uttarakhand has caused a state of concern among scientists.

With Joshimath continuing to sink, reports pointing to potential land subsidence in eight more cities across the state have now come to light. At least three cities in Uttarakhand face the prospect of landslides and erosion. Subsidence is also taking place in Mussoorie, Nainital, Bhatwadi of Uttarkashi, Munsiyari, and Purnagiri of Champawat. Meanwhile, Gopeshwar, Karanprayag and Srinagar are also under threat.

Professor Y P Sundriyal, head of the department of geology at the Central University of Srinagar Garhwal, has warned that large parts of Srinagar are situated on the debris of floods, and unplanned construction here, can prove to be dangerous.

Speaking to TNIE , Sundriyal said, "The landscaping of Gopeshwar's land is similar to that of Joshimath as the ground surface here is also completely on landslide material and the hard rock is 100 metres below. In such a situation, whatever heavy structure is being prepared for settlement, it is being done on landslide material. The cracks of Karnaprayag should not be underestimated".

Sundariyal added, "The Mandakini Valley had caused terrible devastation in the Kedarnath disaster of 2013, but we did not learn from it. On the contrary, construction in many places is being done on the debris of the disaster, which can be very deadly in the future."

Meanwhile, a geophysical and geotechnical survey will be carried out by a team of scientists from the Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology, IIT Roorkee, and the National Geophysical Research Institute (NGRI) Hyderabad in Joshimath.

The surveys will be key to studying the landslides and will reveal the path of water flow in the region. The study will also reveal the pressure of water underground and highlight the possibilities which could lead to water getting off the ground.

The geophysical survey will also reveal the status of silt and clay in the water present under the ground.

Geologist Dr AK Biyani said," It has been clear in previous scientific research that Joshimath glacier is situated on the mud. It is clear that the thickness of this mud will be different at different places. If it is moving, then what is its direction of motion? NGRI Hyderabad has expertise in this work."

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