An event of Note : The 7th World Landslide Forum, to be hosted by India in November 2026.

Photo of a landslide from the first post in this blog of Sep2007 when SaveTheHills was formed.

SaveTheHills was formed in September 2007 in the aftermath of intense rainfall that struck North Bengal and Sikkim in the first week of that month. The resulting deluge triggered widespread landslides and devastation. We began documenting these events through the STH blog to build a lasting historical record of a recurring hazard that continues to trouble the region year after year.

Nearly two decades on, landslides remain at the core of our work and concern. It is therefore heartening news that the 7th World Landslide Forum (WLF7) will be hosted in Faridabad, India, under the auspices of Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham from 23–27Nov2026.

In this connection, while attending the first virtual TOWNHALL for WLF7 on 19Apr2026 (see below), we hope to participate in and learn from the forum in Nov2026.

Praful Rao
SaveTheHills
savethehills@gmail.com
9475033744

Inducting affordable ICT to empower ourselves : Drones for forest fire control

The reason for the forest fires becomes amply clear when we see the above rainfall map from IMD. Like much of the country, the Darjeeling-Sikkim Himalaya is running almost 89% deficient in rainfall and the forests are full of tinder dry foliage.


Praful Rao,
Kalimpong,
Dist Kalimpong

Quake Report : 7.9R earthquake near Kathmandu (Nepal) at 12:15:20hrs IST on 25Apr2015

 

28.131°N 84.649°E. Depth=15.0 km (9.3 mi) 

Nearby Cities

1. 49km (30mi) E of Lamjung, Nepal
2. 69km (43mi) NW of Kirtipur, Nepal
3. 70km (43mi) NW of Kathmandu, Nepal
4. 70km (43mi) NE of Bharatpur, Nepal
5. 72km (45mi) NW of Patan, Nepal

       Tectonic Summary
Seismotectonics of the Himalaya and Vicinity

1. Seismicity in the Himalaya dominantly results from the continental collision of the India and Eurasia plates, which are converging at a relative rate of 40-50 mm/yr. Northward underthrusting of India beneath Eurasia generates numerous earthquakes and consequently makes this area one of the most seismically hazardous regions on Earth. The surface expression of the plate boundary is marked by the foothills of the north-south trending Sulaiman Range in the west, the Indo-Burmese Arc in the east and the east-west trending Himalaya Front in the north of India.(Read more here)
   
   You can get technical updates of the earthquake here and here
   
   As per news reports, death toll in Nepal at the time of writing is 150 with another 18 deaths being reported in India. 14 after shocks have been reported. The fatalities will certainly increase with time and also the bad news is that this quake comes just as the SW monsoons are around the corner and we have 5 months of rains ahead where water ingress into the cracks and fissures in the mountains formed as a result of the 7.9R quake will lead to landslides.
   
   Sources : USGS/CNN
   
   Praful Rao,
   Kalimpong,
   Dist Darjeeling
   1530h (IST)
   
   
   

Upcoming event : UGC Conference at Maynaguri College (Dist. Jalpaiguri, W. Bengal) on 'Major Environmental Issues' (03-04Sep2015)

Conference Organizing Convener
Dr. Madhusudan Karmakar,
Maynaguri college, (Dist Jalpaiguri)
West Bengal
Email: madhukarmakar.2008@rediffmail.com

Praful Rao,
Kalimpong,
Dist Darjeeling

' The Winter of Discontent in Uttarakhand ' - an article by Dr RK Bhandari

The Winter of Discontent in Uttarakhand

In John Steinbeck’s last novel 'The Winter of Discontent', I find at least three phrases which make my heart weep in the thick of the ghastly landslide and flood tragedy in Uttarakhand. It is a tragedy that right now stares my country in the face. Steinbeck said “I shall revenge myself in the cruelest way you can imagine. I shall forget it.” We shall also forget this for we seem to have lost our faculty to remember! He said,” It’s so much darker when a light goes out than it would have been if it had never shone.” We too are used to living in darkness perhaps because the darkness is not yet dark enough for us to see the stars. Finally, we agree with Steinbeck that “To be alive at all is to have scars” because we have these in plenty and we have to close our eyes if we do not wish to see the writing on the wall!

We have repeatedly failed the people of disaster-torn India, always leaving them high and dry in the times of disasters. It is not for the first time that floods and landslides have ravaged Uttarakhand. We may have forgotten the devastating episodes of 2010 and 2012, the great Alaknanda Tragedy of July 1970 and the great Malpa tragedy of 18 August 1998 but the victims of those tragedies are still bleeding. When the great Alaknanda tragedy struck, I know from personal knowledge that the blame for landslides and floods at once went to the cloudburst because that was the easiest thing for us to do. It is true that when the Alaknanda Tragedy struck in July 1970, the previous maxima of 200mm rainfall recorded at Joshimath on 28 September 1924 was crossed by an all time high rainfall of 212.8mm which occurred in 20 hours of time between 2pm of 20 July 1970 and 8am of 21 July 1970 . It is no less true however that we were not quite honest in throwing the entire blame to the cloud burst when the real blame should have gone to our utter failure of putting a full stop to plundering of environment, mindless urbanization, non-engineered constructions of roads, buildings, reservoirs and dams, and indiscriminate and often illegal mining and quarrying of natural resources. Rather than admitting our blunders and learning lessons in humility, is it not a shame that we keep attributing tragedy after tragedy to more or less the very same reason - cloud burst, which is no more than the last straw that breaks the camel’s back. Let us never forget that excessive rainfalls, in this age of climate change , belong to normal life of fragile eco-systems across the globe and unless we mend our ways and manage our lands with the care they deserve , every tragedy will be an early warning for the next in line.

History is replete with examples of our shedding crocodile tears and looking for photo-opportunities, in distribution of relief and paying lip sympathy to the devastated families without an ounce of repentance and penance. The pain in our hearts cannot be gauged when we face corpses that litter our lands. It will show up on our faces only when we lose ourselves in preparing for the worst of the tragedies in the normal times. How nice it would be if the Prime Minister of India were to announce Rs 1000 crore right now for the North East of India telling the Chief Ministers that they will be held accountable if the repeat of 1897 earthquake in Shillong ,were to end up in a catastrophe we perceive. By the way, as far as the seismologists are concerned, a repeat of the great Shillong earthquake is not a matter of IF, but WHEN? Unfortunately, after the dust of a disaster settles down, we simply move into the comfort zone and monotonically continue with our business as usual until the next disaster knocks our door.

When the National Disaster Management Authority was created in December 2005, by an Act of Parliament, we sold the dream of a paradigm shift to the culture of prevention from the relief-centric approach to disaster management. When the Planning Commission added a Chapter on Disaster Management in the Five Year Plan document, we expressed our commitment to integration of disaster management with development planning. When the devastating earthquake hit the state of Gujarat on the Republic day of 2001, we vowed to take a pro-active stance and sanctioned projects which were supposed to deliver earthquake and landslide hazard zonation maps to help architects, engineers and builders ensure safer constructions. If any such thing has happened, I am not aware. If yes, why do we not see a single validated and certified earthquake hazard or landslide hazard zonation map in use by architects, planners and disaster managers anywhere in this huge country? If no, who all are accountable?

Why have we failed to deliver safety to our people in this case? The question may look difficult but its answer is simple. Our systems, institutions and disaster management apparatuses have failed us. India has created a number of institutions with best of the intentions but these institutions are merely solo players within their own close boundary walls and live within comfort zones without accountability. In managing disasters, we need orchestra play. Does anybody in the public even today know that Geological Survey of India is the officially designated nodal agency for landslides in the country, a move which was fiercely opposed by me at the highest level calling it as a historic blunder. This was not because geology is not critical in landslide studies or Geological Survey of India has not done great things but because a multi-disciplinary field of landslide disasters is not its cup of tea. If they are the responsible agency, we should have seen them facing the heat?

Disaster management remains a budding subject on which everybody seems to behave like an expert until the disaster actually hits. In the stampede for the front-rows of visibility in the normal times, those responsible for disaster management often forget that by not doing their jobs well and in running the race merely for paltry gains, they are trampling over the lives and future of the very people who regard them as their beacon of hope in the times of crisis. The political masters usually step-in from nowhere to direct the relief operations from their high chairs, primed by the poorly-informed bureaucrats in attendances trying to save their own skins from the failure to prevent the disaster. The rapid-action-forces, army and agencies like the Border Roads Organization remain our only hope but how much they can do when Rome is already burning.
Our people need to be made aware. If we fail to feed in right information to the right people at the right time, the astrologers will naturally fault the stars and the journalists will naturally report what they can pick from the heaps of confusion. Now when we know what ails our system, let’s join hands and unitedly fix it. In states like Uttarakhand, where disasters repeat frequently, highest order of expertise is required to advise the government on matters connected with formulation of policy, practice of engineering, selection of technology, capacity building and training. Like Uttarakhand, our country has many states which are affected by more than one type of disaster. Imagine if another disaster, natural or man-made were to strike our mother land at this moment when we stand fully exhausted.

________________________________________________________________________

Prof RK Bhandari is a distinguished alumnus from IIT Mumbai, a Fellow of Indian National Academy of Engineering  and a recipient of the coveted Varne’s Medal for Excellence in Research and Practice of Landslides.

Praful Rao,
Kalimpong

Death of Cyclone MAHASEN (17May2013) & lessons learnt.

Infra Red (IR) image of 17May2013 (4.30AM IST), above shows Cyclone MAHASEN has almost dissipated and though 45 died in Bangladesh, it spared Myanmar and the displaced Rohingya Muslims there, almost entirely.

Lessons learnt
1. Adequate advance warning.
Thanks to frequent updates of satellite images and information from a number of excellent websites, STH monitored the progress of the storm from 10May (when it started as a depression, south of the Andaman islands) upto 16May2013 (when it made landfall in Bangladesh).
This is reassuring.
With this lead time available, large scale evacuation of population was possible from low lying areas in Bangladesh and Myanmar and the death toll in this storm was almost negligible compared to Cyclone Sidr which killed 4000 in Bangladesh and Cyclone Nargis which wiped out over 100,000 in Myanmar.
2. Accuracy of predicted movement of the Cyclone.
The movement of the storm was predicted accurately and there was almost no deviation from predicted track except that it strayed 100km northward in the fag end, hence avoiding Myanmar.
This again is reassuring because it is now possible for the average citizen, armed with just a broadband connection and laptop, to empower him/herself about the accurate position/track and movement of major adverse weather systems which might affect their communities.
3. Almost no media attention in India about Cyclone MAHASEN.
Perhaps because Cyclone MAHASEN did not threaten the Indian landmass, all major print and electronic media were largely silent about a huge tropical cyclone shimmying up the eastern coastline.
This was a pity because I found a large number of intelligentsia (let alone the common man on the street) in Kolkata were totally unaware of a storm breathing fire in its close proximity (on 15May2013).


Praful Rao,
Kalimpong

The first landslide report of 2013 ie (01/2013)

Even as Sikkim Express reported training being conducted in Disaster Management in North Sikkim (see above), the Telegraph of 30 Mar2013, reported the first landslides in this region for the year 2013, luckily there were no fatalities.

An excerpt of the report from the Telegraph of 30Mar2013 is placed below :-

"Landslides

Siliguri, March 29: Two rain-triggered landslides in Sikkim’s North district today stranded 300-350 tourists going from Gangtok to Lachen and Lachung, both over 90km from the state’s capital.

There are no reports of deaths. The subsidence happened between 6pm and 6.30pm, according to Border Roads Organisation (BRO) sources. The roads from Chungthang to Lachen and Lachung both got blocked.

There are reports of tourists stuck on both sides. The BRO sources said no road repair work could be started in the evening as the rain has continued unabated."

It is well known that we live in an area where the landslide fatalities are the highest in the world  and that the Geological Survey of India has categorized us in the most landslide prone zones in the country (see below).

One of our endeavors in STH is to catalogue and maintain a record of this disaster form so that we may study its causes and help us live with this hazard in the best way possible.

Praful Rao,

Kalimpong

STH Activities : Training workshop on Disaster Management at Darjeeling (15Mar2013)

Praful Rao

World Bank publication on 'Community based landslide risk reduction: Managing disasters in small steps'

Abstract from the above book:

This book has two main aims: to demonstrate to international development agencies, governments, policy makers, project managers, practitioners, and community residents that landslide hazard can often be reduced in vulnerable urban communities in the developing world, and to provide practical guidance for those in charge of delivering Management of Slope Stability in Communities (MoSSaiC) on the ground. The purpose of the book is to take readers into the most vulnerable communities in order to understand and address rainfall-triggered landslide hazards in these areas. Community residents are not just seen as those at risk, but as the people with the best practical knowledge of the slopes in their neighborhood. As used here, 'community based' means engaging and working with communities to find and deliver solutions to landslide risk together. This approach leads governments to develop new practices and policies for tackling landslide risk. This book standardizes those elements of MoSSaiC that have led to its successful implementation in the Eastern Caribbean, and that are essential to the overall objectives (such as community engagement, mapping localized slope features, and broad drainage design principles). The book's nine chapters provide guidance to project managers and practitioners on the entire end-to-end process of community-based landslide risk reduction. While certain chapters are more directly relevant to one audience than another, it is helpful for all audiences to read the 'getting started' section of each chapter and be alerted to the nine project milestones.


Comments by Praful Rao
SaveTheHills is in contact with Prof Malcolm G Anderson, co-author of the book - which features a photograph and reference to Dumsi Pakha, a small village in Kalimpong (see page 41 of book) which is particularly vulnerable and has a terrain and problem similar to the areas mentioned in the publication.
My thanks to Drs Malcolm Anderson and Elizabeth Holcombe.
The book is available as a free download from here