Building resilience for the cross-border disaster

The recent landslides across Darjeeling led to the closure of critical routes such as NH 717E, which connects Sikkim and Siliguri, as roads were washed away and connectivity was severed. This highlights that when vital corridors become untraversable, they transform from arteries of development into chokepoints of vulnerability.

The first week of October saw heavy rainfall triggering widespread landslides across northern West Bengal, claiming lives, shutting down tourist destinations, and causing extensive damage to infrastructure and
agricultural land. Failure in one of
the gates caused a spillage at Bhutan’s Tala Hydropower Dam, putting the Dooars region under flood alert. These events illustrate an essential aspect: the intersection of transboundary
disaster risks, local hazards, and impacts of climate change in Northeast India and the neighbouring countries needs attention.

The implications go beyond immediate damages. Hazard vulnerability also carries strategic implications. Northeast India’s geographical position, integrated with geopolitical complexities and cross-border dynamics, means disaster vulnerability may create security vulnerability. When roads collapse and communication lines fail, the region becomes not just isolated but exposed. Climate-induced instability in border areas can create scenarios that can enhance existing sensitivities.

Floodplains attract dense populations due to fertile alluvial soil and water access for agriculture. This is a difficult demographic reality to change. Rather than viewing this as a problem requiring relocation, infrastructure planning needs to examine such patterns and design accordingly. The question is not whether disasters will occur but whether our infrastructure can withstand them when they do.

These calamities in the last few years have had an escalatory trend. Research evidence shows that more than 70% of all the districts in the Northeastern states are expected to have an increase in rainfall by almost 25%. The region’s geography, characterised by young mountains, active seismic zones, and major river systems originating
in glaciers and glacial lakes, amounts to inherent vulnerability. Erratic rainfall patterns, glacial lake outbursts, and ever-intensified storm systems amplify the region’s natural risk due to climate change.

A shift from reactive to proactive disaster resilience planning is imperative. Critical infrastructures cannot remain limited by annual hazard cycles. Integrated frameworks among the National Disaster Management Authority, National Highways Authority, and state agencies are needed to actively share mapped hazard data and periodic risk assessments, ensuring disaster resilience becomes a fundamental design parameter in project planning.

Geospatial technology offers reliable solutions. By overlaying geological, hydro-meteorological, and socio-economic data, it is possible to identify where infrastructure can be built safely and predict and monitor potential failures before starting such massive projects. The technology can also help assess carrying capacity – understanding what each terrain can withstand – and locate optimal sites for development and emergency response infrastructure. Countries like Japan have actively incorporated advanced geospatial modelling that can simulate how proposed structures would perform under various disaster scenarios. This approach can save lives and is more cost-effective than post-disaster reconstruction.

The cross-border impacts of these hazards are significant. When Bhutan’s dam overflow threatened Northern West Bengal, it highlighted how upstream events immediately affect downstream communities. This also results in interstate and international tensions. The West Bengal government blames projects in Bhutan and Sikkim, while Bangladesh blames India for limiting its full rights to the surface water. While the India-Bangladesh Joint Rivers Commission met in September, the conversations were usual and had no concrete outcomes. As the Ganges Water Treaty lapses in 2026, such bodies need to focus on incorporating norms regarding disaster preparedness, management, and data sharing protocols.

The July floods in Nepal, caused by a glacial lake outburst in Tibet, can be a learning chapter for states like Arunachal Pradesh. China’s announcement of a mega dam construction in the Tibet Autonomous Region, near Arunachal Pradesh, adds urgency to India’s resilience planning. The state is home to many indigenous communities and a major biodiversity hotspot. It is not easy, as any infrastructure project in the state must navigate protected ecological status and community engagement requirements.

While real-time exchange of hydrological and meteorological monitoring data, enhanced by geospatial monitoring systems, could offer crucial time frames for evacuation and preparation, it also helps in negotiations based on empirical data. Geospatial analysis can help identify locations that minimise ecological disruption while meeting infrastructure needs, providing evidence-based inputs for stakeholders to consider.

India can take the lead

Such cooperation serves multiple purposes, as saving lives and livelihoods from disasters can also be a confidence-building measure in the region. Disaster preparedness is a common ground for cooperation and matters of collective interest. For India, taking the lead in such regional initiatives on disaster resilience presents an avenue for constructive engagement as soft power with the downstream regions, spearheaded by skills in technology and humanitarian concern rather than assertive measures.

Seeing these disasters as periodic occurrences in Northeast India and not single events would completely change the infrastructure development approach. A road or bridge designed today should cater to hazards it would experience throughout its lifespan, built with consideration for extreme floods that happen once every 50 years, not averaged out concerning yearly flows.

This requires sustained research and investment, interagency cooperation, and political will to prioritise resilience in the long term. Geospatial technology offers the analytical framework and platforms to assess and visualise risks, while implementation demands collaboration across state and national frontiers. Reactive alternatives grow costlier with each passing flood season. These recent incidents are eye-openers that the time for systematic disaster preparation is now.

(The writer is a geospatial research analyst at the Takshashila Institution)

(Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.)

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