New Delhi: Thousands of people in an Indian Himalayan city face relocation as authorities on Tuesday stepped up evacuation efforts in the temple town, which is sinking due to land subsidence.
Joshimath, a town of 25,000 people in Chamoli district in the northern state of Uttarakhand, is on a major Hindu pilgrimage circuit. It is situated on a hill near the China border, where two valleys meet at an altitude of over 1,800 metres.
In the 1970s, a government study warned that the city was sinking, and recommended a ban on large-scale construction work in the area, but the warnings were ignored.
Since then, the place has become a busy gateway for hundreds of thousands of tourists and pilgrims every year to the Hindu temple town of Badrinath, 20 kilometers away.
But hundreds of homes in the city have developed dangerous cracks over the past two months and it was declared a disaster-prone area on Monday.
Nand Kishor Joshi, a disaster management official who assessed the situation in Joshimath, told Arab News, “About 400 people have been moved to safer places after seeing cracks in their houses.”
Tirath Singh Rawat, a local MP from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, said that more than 600 houses have already been identified for evacuation.
“We are still assessing it and a team from Delhi is visiting the area to assess the situation,” he added.
Local officials have announced demolition plans across the city, starting with two large hotels to prevent other buildings from being razed to the ground.
Chamoli District Magistrate Himanshu Khurana told Arab News, “The demolition of the two buildings is going to start today, under the supervision of the Central Building Research Institute, as both the structures were found to be unsafe.”
With at least 30 per cent of the city submerged, residents fear being forced to leave their ancestral land forever.
Mohan Singh, an Ayurveda doctor from Joshimath, said: “My family has been living in the city for generations. How can we think of moving out of town? We will not go anywhere; The government has to find some way to keep us here.
He attributed the current situation on large infrastructure projects in the region.
Despite being assessed by geologists as a geologically fragile area, several hydroelectric projects have been built around the city, with roads laid and tunnels built to improve connectivity.
“Drilling that started a decade ago for a hydroelectric project has caused maximum damage.
“It is the seat of the Hindu saint Shankaracharya, and the main shrines are here; There should be a limit on footfall in this area,” said Singh.
Not only the residents but environmentalists are also alert about the construction works.
“There is a lot of blasting and drilling going on for hydroelectric projects, which is undermining the basic foundation of Joshimath,”
said Kavita Upadhyay, an environmental researcher based in Uttarakhand.
“There is no proper drainage system within Joshimath. There is no system for disposal of dirty water. All the wastewater goes underground, and it sinks the finer material further down into the ground, further sinking the land.
Delhi-based environmentalist Vimlendu Jha warned that the situation could soon spread beyond Joshimath.
“The resilience of the Himalayas cannot be tested further. Many Himalayan towns and villages will be submerged in the years to come.
For decades, experts have been warning about the development model being followed in Uttarakhand.
“More than 66 tunnels are being constructed in different parts of Uttarakhand, and so are dams, which have been rocking the entire state for decades, despite all the experts warning against them.
“In fact, in the entire Himalayan region, from Dharamshala to Arunachal, massive infrastructure projects are posing a threat to the fragile Himalayan ecosystem,” Jha said.