For those living in the Western Himalayan region, there was nothing august about August 2025, or the two months preceding it. The states of Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh and the Union Territories (UTs) of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh were battered by a series of extreme weather events, from heavy rains to cloudbursts to flash floods, as soon as the monsoon season officially began on May 24. The chain of tragedies started as early as May 27, when a cloudburst triggered flash floods and landslides in north Kashmir’s Kupwara district and damaged the under-construction 12 MW Karnah Hydro Power Project. From that point on, nearly every week brought one or more disasters. An analysis by Down To Earth (DTE) shows that between June 1 and August 31, these four states and UTs experienced extreme weather events on 88 out of 92 days and recorded 506 deaths. In other words, they accounted for nearly one-quarter of all monsoon-related fatalities across the country during that period.
In fact, the number of days during which the four states and UTs have experienced extreme events (which include heavy rains, floods, landslides, cloudburst, lightning and storms) is higher than in any other monsoon season since 2022. In Jammu and Kashmir, the proportion of days with extreme weather events during the first three months of the monsoon season has increased from 10.8 per cent in 2022 to 51 per cent. The proportion of extreme weather days have almost doubled in Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Ladakh.
Invariably, the main cause of the disasters has been the intensity of extreme rain. Between June 1 and September 5, three of these four states and UTs received “excess” rainfall (20-59 per cent surplus rainfall than normal, as categorised by the India Meteorological Department or IMD) and one experienced “large excess” rainfall (60 per cent surplus rainfall than normal). Uttarakhand received 24 per cent excess rainfall, while Himachal Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir received 47 per cent and 44 per cent excess rainfall respectively. Ladakh, the cold desert situated in the Himalayas’ rain shadow area, received an astounding 434 per cent large excess rainfall. Most of this precipitation occurred in a very short period of time, resulting in flash floods and landslides.
Consider this. On July 1, Mandi district of Himachal Pradesh received almost 2,000 per cent surplus rainfall. Nearly 13 per cent of Mandi’s average seasonal monsoon rainfall fell in just 24 hours, creating a flood-like situation across the district.
About 14 people lost their lives. A similar disaster unfolded in Uttarakhand which between August 5 and 6, received 421 per cent above average rainfall, says Akshay Deoras, research scientist at the National Centre for Atmospheric Science and Department of Meteorology, University of Reading, UK. This led to massive floods and deadly mudslides. “On August 5 alone, Uttarkashi district, the epicentre of the deadly mudslide, recorded over 100 mm of rain in around seven hours, while areas surrounding the disaster location reportedly saw more than 400 mm rainfall within a few hours. This is nearly two-thirds of the total rainfall London Heathrow receives in an entire year,” says Deoras. “The steep terrain around Dharali village, where the tragedy occurred, acted like a chute, accelerating mud and debris into a deadly rush downhill,” he adds.
The intensity of rainfall in the Western Himalayas can be gauged from the fact that in just three weeks…
This article was originally published in the September 16-30, 2025 print edition of Down To Earth