The valley of Kashmir witnessed three cloudbursts yesterday – one in Kulgam district and two in Bandipora district. This was after Kashmir witnessed an extended heatwave lasting more than a month. The old timers speak about this year’s heat and say they have never witnessed anything like this for decades. Indeed this year has been recorded to be the hottest that Kashmir has ever witnessed. Never before has Kashmir witnessed such a freak weather. People were forced to en masse visit Sufi shrines barefoot praying for rainfall. In some places people resorted to traditional dance of Dambhali to pray to skies for rain.
Prayers are fine but one needs to dive deeper into the causes of these prolonged hot and humid conditions. How can we tide over this? One theory suggests massive plantation exercises as one important step. Other suggest Miyawaki forest technique in urban areas. However, the important thing is that we as citizens of this kost beautiful place in South Asia have to realise that we are living in an ecologically fragile zone. Massive concrete structures including palatial residential mansions and commercial complexes can be excessively harmful to the valley’s ecological balance.
As we speak the Bandipora-Gurez had to be closed yesterday due to the freak weather conditions. The squally rains brought down trees in large numbers and crops in hundreds of acres of land was destroyed due to the flash floods in Bandipora and Kulgam districts. These are extremely weather occurrences. Since there is a prediction of almost two more days of rainfall the low lying areas and those susceptible to flash floods need to be extremely careful.
We need to take care of our environment and it definitely will take care of us. We have to understand that every married person aspiring for a standalone house of his own is a bad aspiration and it comes at a huge cost to environment. Let better sense prevail.
