Joshimath sinking: Isro report on land subsidence ‘mysteriously withdrawn’
A report from the Indian Space Research Organisation’s (Isro) National Remote Sensing Centre(NRSC), Hyderabad, showed the land subsidence.
In Uttarakhand’s ‘sinking’ town Joshimath has been mysteriously “withdrawn”. The Joshimath Land subsidence report is not available on the NRSC website anymore.
Satellite data-based preliminary results, compiled by the NRSC and ISRO, said the Uttarakhand hill town recorded rapid subsidence between December 27, 2022 and January 8, 2023 and sank by 5.4 cm.
The link to the pdf report is not working anymore. The report indicated the gravity of the situation in the holy town in the Chamoli district of Uttarakhand.
“The region subsided around -5 cm within a span of a few days and the areal extent of subsidence has also increased. But it is confined to the central part of Joshimath town,” Isro said in a release with the satellite imagery.
Researchers identified a subsidence zone resembling a generic landslide shape and maintained that the “Crown of the subsidence is located near Joshimath-Auli road at a height of 2180 meters.”
“Slow subsidence up to 9 cm within the Joshimath town recorded over a period of 7 months, between April and November 2022,” Isro said.
JOSHIMATH CRISIS
Joshimath, the gateway to famous pilgrimage sites like Badrinath and Hemkund Sahib and international skiing destination Auli, is facing a major challenge due to land subsidence. It is clearly headed for a disaster as more and more houses have developed cracks, prompting people to shift to relief centres set up by the government.
The biggest reason why Joshimath is sinking is related to the geography of the town. The landslide debris on which the city was established has a low bearing capacity and experts have long warned that it cannot support a high rate of construction. Increased construction, hydroelectric projects, and the widening of the National Highway have made the slopes highly unstable in the last couple of decades.
On Friday, Uttarakhand CM Pushkar Dhami chaired a cabinet meeting during which a slew of decisions, including a six-month waiver of water and electricity bills and a one-year moratorium on recovery of bank loans, were taken to provide succour to the affected people. Cabinet ministers will donate their one month’s salary to the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund to assist the sinking town’s residents.