Shakil Ahmad Romshoo

Morphotectonic and lithostratigraphic analysis of intermontane Karewa Basin of Kashmir Himalayas, India

Morpho-tectonic study plays an important role in deciphering the effects of tectonic activity in the geomorphic evolution of the drainage basins. Romushi watershed forms one of the major watersheds of the intermontane Karewa Basin of Kashmir Valley. The Karewa sediments are characterized by glacio-fluvio-lacustrine deposits capped by the aeolian loess. The geomorphic, morphometric and lithostratigraphic studies of these cap deposits have been carried out to elucidate the effect of tectonics on the geomorphic evolution of Romushi Watershed. Geomorphic mapping was carried out using GPS measurements, DEM at 30m resolution, Topographic Position Index (TPI) model, topographic maps, LANDSAT TM Imagery and field data. Morphometric and morphotectonic analyses in GIS environment were used to calculate various geomorphic indices (Mountain Front Sinuosity Index, Bifurcation Ratio, Asymmetry Factor, River Profile, etc). These indices reveal that the tectonic uplift observed in the region due to Himalayan orogeny coupled with mass movement and aeolian deposition have dominated the landscape evolution of intermontane Karewa Basin of Kashmir throughout the Late Quaternary Period. Additional data from lithostratigraphic measurements were analyzed to understand the geomorphic evolution of intermontane Karewa Basin. The data revealed that the basin has experienced differential uplift and erosion rates from time to time in the geological past. This was corroborated by the results from the morphometric and morphotectonic analysis.

Assessing the influence of watershed characteristics on the flood vulnerability of Jhelum basin in Kashmir Himalaya

Abstract In Himalayan region, it is very important to generate detailed terrain information for identifying the causes of natural hazards such as debris flows, debris floods, and flash floods, so that appropriate corrective measures are initiated for reducing the risk of the people and property to these disasters. Basic watershed morphometrics coupled with the land-cover and slope information are useful for assessing the hazard vulnerability. The terrain characteristics govern the surface hydrology and have profound influence on the incidence and magnitude of natural hazards, particularly floods. The present work is a comparative study of two watersheds of Jhelum basin (upper Indus basin in Kashmir). In this research, we make an integrated use of the Linear Imaging Self-Scanner satellite data and Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer digital elevation model, supported with extensive field information, in a GIS environment for assessing the surface hydrological behavior of Lidder and Rembiara watersheds of the Jhelum basin. Knowledge-driven modelling approach has been used to evaluate the runoff potential of the watersheds to assess the flood vulnerability downstream. The results revealed that Lidder watershed exhibits lesser basin lag time compared to Rembiara watershed for a storm event. Further, due to higher population density in the Lidder downstream, this watershed is also socially more vulnerable to flooding than Rembiara. The methodology and results of this study shall help in formulating better flood mitigation strategies in this part of the Himalayan region, where the observation network of hydrometeorological and other land surface parameters is either missing or very scanty.

Morphometric Analysis to Infer Hydrological Behaviour of Lidder Watershed, Western Himalaya, India

West Lidder River, in the Northwest Greater-Himalayan mountain range, is the major source of irrigation and drinking water supplies for the Kashmir Valley with a population of seven million people. The major source of water for the whole Lidder River is snow and icemelt emanating from its two subcatchments East Lidder and West Lidder. Snowmelt significantly contributes to the evolution of drainage patterns in this area. Quantitative morphometry plays a vital role in routing the snowmelt and other hydrological processes. Morphometric analysis of the West Lidder River catchment was carried out using geospatial technique. The outcome revealed that the entire study area has uniform lithology and is structurally permeable. The high drainage density of all subwatersheds indicate more surface runoff. The morphometric analysis also indicates that the area is more prone to weathering due to very-coarse to coarse drainage texture. All the subwatersheds showed dendritic to subdendritic drainage pattern. An immense control of structure on the drainage in some subwatersheds is indicated by their high bifurcation ratios. Circulatory and elongation ratios show that the subwatersheds have elongated to circular shapes. From the integrated analysis of the morphometric parameters, important hydrologic behaviour of 17 subwatersheds could be inferred.

Implications of Shrinking Cryosphere Under Changing Climate on the Streamflows in the Lidder Catchment in the Upper Indus Basin, India

Abstract Lidder tributary in the Upper Indus Basin (UIB) of the Himalayas, an important source of surface and ground water, is experiencing clear indications of climate change. In the basin, minimum, maximum, and average temperatures are showing a significant increasing trend in all the four seasons. Precipitation is showing insignificant decrease over time in the basin. However, the proportion of snow is decreasing and correspondingly, the proportion of rains is increasing. The temperature projections also show increasing trends for the end of this century. The time-series analysis of the Normalized Difference Snow Index (NDSI) shows a depletion of the snow-cover in the region. Furthermore, during the past 51 years, the glacier area in the basin has decreased from 46.09 km2 in 1962 to 33.43 km2 in 2013, a depletion of 27.47%. As a result of glacier recession in the basin, the streamflow fed predominantly by snowmelt and glacier melt, is showing a statistically significant decline since the mid-1990s. The declining streamflows have potential to adversely affect agriculture, energy production, tourism, and even domestic water supplies. The Snowmelt Runoff Model (SRM) was tested for estimating the runoff from this glaciated basin on an operational basis. The average simulated runoff 11.94 m3 s-1 at the outlet is in concordance with the average measured runoff 13.51 m3 s-1 showing R2 of 0.82. The model could thus be used for snowmelt runoff estimation, on an operational basis, for judicious utilization of the depleting water resources in the region.

Sustainability of winter tourism in a changing climate over Kashmir Himalaya

Mountain areas are sensitive to climate change. Implications of climate change can be seen in less snow, receding glaciers, increasing temperatures, and decreasing precipitation. Climate change is also a severe threat to snow-related winter sports such as skiing, snowboarding, and cross-country skiing. The change in climate will put further pressure on the sensitive environment of high mountains. Therefore, in this study, an attempt has been made to know the impact of climate change on the snow precipitation, water resources, and winter tourism in the two famous tourist resorts of the Kashmir Valley. Our findings show that winters are getting prolonged with little snow falls on account of climate change. The average minimum and maximum temperatures are showing statistically significant increasing trends for winter months. The precipitation is showing decreasing trends in both the regions. A considerable area in these regions remains under the snow and glacier cover throughout the year especially during the winter and spring seasons. However, time series analysis of LandSat MODIS images using Normalized Difference Snow Index shows a decreasing trend in snow cover in both the regions from past few years. Similarly, the stream discharge, comprising predominantly of snow- and glacier-melt, is showing a statistically significant declining trend despite the melting of these glaciers. The predicted futuristic trends of temperature from Predicting Regional Climates for Impact Studies regional climate model are showing an increase which may enhance snow-melting in the near future posing a serious threat to the sustainability of winter tourism in the region. Hence, it becomes essential to monitor the changes in temperature and snow cover depletion in these basins in order to evaluate their effect on the winter tourism and water resources in the region.

Integrating biophysical and socioeconomic information for prioritizing watersheds in a Kashmir Himalayan lake: a remote sensing and GIS approach

Dal Lake, a cradle of Kashmiri civilization has strong linkage with socioeconomics of the state of Jammu and Kashmir. During last few decades, anthropogenic pressures in Dal Lake Catchment have caused environmental deterioration impairing, inter-alia, sustained biotic communities and water quality. The present research was an integrated impact analysis of socioeconomic and biophysical processes at the watershed level on the current status of Dal Lake using multi-sensor and multi-temporal satellite data, simulation modelling together with field data verification. Thirteen watersheds (designated as ‘W1–W13’) were identified and investigated for land use/land cover change detection, quantification of erosion and sediment loads and socioeconomic analysis (total population, total households, literacy rate and economic development status). All the data for the respective watersheds was integrated into the GIS environment based upon multi-criteria analysis and knowledge-based weightage system was adopted for watershed prioritization based on its factors and after carefully observing the field situation. The land use/land cover change detection revealed significant changes with a uniform trend of decreased vegetation and increased impervious surface cover. Increased erosion and sediment loadings were recorded for the watersheds corresponding to their changing land systems, with bare and agriculture lands being the major contributors. The prioritization analysis revealed that W5 > W2 > W6 > W8 > W1 ranked highest in priority and W13 > W3 > W4 > W11 > W7 under medium priority. W12 > W9 > W10 belonged to low-priority category. The integration of the biophysical and the socioeconomic environment at the watershed level using modern geospatial tools would be of vital importance for the conservation and management strategies of Dal Lake ecosystem.

Assessing the influence of watershed characteristics on the flood vulnerability of Jhelum basin in Kashmir Himalaya: reply to comment by Shah 2015

This is a response to the comment made by Shah (2015) to the study carried out by Meraj et al. (2015), published in the Natural Hazards (doi:10.1007/s11069-015-1775-x). We thank the commentator for his comments on our manuscript. The original manuscript published by Meraj et al. (2015) focused on the influence of the geomorphology and land cover on flood vulnerability in two Himalaya watersheds: one each from the Pir Panjal and Greater Himalaya ranges. The 2014 floods were mentioned in the manuscript just to indicate the validity and correctness of the approach adopted to assess the vulnerability of these two watersheds in Kashmir basin (KB). KB is also synonymously used for Karewa basin or Jhelum basin as well. The downstream areas of both these watersheds were inundated during the 2014 floods up to varying depths and duration. The September 2014 floods in the KB were a consequence of the extreme rainfall event that was quite widespread in extent. The situation was exacerbated due to the loss of wetlands, unplanned urbanization, the siltation of water courses in KB and the inadequate flood control infrastructure (Romshoo 2015). The commentator has made most of the comments about the genesis of 2014 floods, which was not specifically the focus of the research published by Meraj et al. (2015), and hence the genesis of the 2014 floods was not addressed therein. It is therefore appropriate that the comments made in Shah (2015) are properly responded to point by point, in order to provide a balanced perspective to the readership of the journal, and are as follows:

Recent glacier changes in the Kashmir Alpine Himalayas, India

Abstract Using Landsat data at decadal interval (1980–2013), the glacier fluctuations (glacier area, equilibrium line altitude and specific mass balance) of nine benchmark glaciers in Kashmir Himalaya were estimated. The observed changes were related to topographic and climatic variables in order to understand their influence. From the data analysis, it was observed that the glaciers have shrunk by 17%, ELA has shifted upwards (80–300 m) and SMB shows variation in glacier mass loss from −0.77 to −0.16 m.w.e. Annual air temperature showed a significant increasing trend, and a slight but insignificant decrease in precipitation was observed during the period. It is evident that in the same climatic regime, varying topography plays a key role in determining the glacier changes. It is believed that the observed changes in the glacier geometry and dynamics, if continued, shall have adverse effect on the streamflows, water supplies and other dependent sectors in the region.

Morphometry and land cover based multi-criteria analysis for assessing the soil erosion susceptibility of the western Himalayan watershed

Complex mountainous environments such as Himalayas are highly susceptibility to natural hazards particular those that are triggered by the action of water such as floods, soil erosion, mass movements and siltation of the hydro-electric power dams. Among all the natural hazards, soil erosion is the most implicit and the devastating hazard affecting the life and property of the millions of people living in these regions. Hence to review and devise strategies to reduce the adverse impacts of soil erosion is of utmost importance to the planners of watershed management programs in these regions. This paper demonstrates the use of satellite based remote sensing data coupled with the observational field data in a multi-criteria analytical (MCA) framework to estimate the soil erosion susceptibility of the sub-watersheds of the Rembiara basin falling in the western Himalaya, using geographical information system (GIS). In this paper, watershed morphometry and land cover are used as an inputs to the MCA framework to prioritize the sub-watersheds of this basin on the basis of their different susceptibilities to soil erosion. Methodology included the derivation of a set of drainage and land cover parameters that act as the indicators of erosion susceptibility. Further the output from the MCA resulted in the categorization of the sub-watersheds into low, medium, high and very high erosion susceptibility classes. A detailed prioritization map for the susceptible sub-watersheds based on the combined role of land cover and morphometry is finally presented. Besides, maps identifying the susceptible sub-watersheds based on morphometry and land cover only are also presented. The results of this study are part of the watershed management program in the study area and are directed to instigate appropriate measures to alleviate the soil erosion in the study area.

Modelling catchment hydrological responses in a Himalayan Lake as a function of changing land use and land cover

In this paper, we evaluate the impact of changing land use/land cover (LULC) on the hydrological processes in Dal lake catchment of Kashmir Himalayas by integrating remote sensing, simulation modelling and extensive field observations. Over the years, various anthropogenic pressures in the lake catchment have significantly altered the land system, impairing, inter-alia, sustained biotic communities and water quality of the lake. The primary objective of this paper was to help a better understanding of the LULC change, its driving forces and the overall impact on the hydrological response patterns. Multi-sensor and multi-temporal satellite data for 1992 and 2005 was used for determining the spatio-temporal dynamics of the lake catchment. Geographic Information System (GIS) based simulation model namely Generalized Watershed Loading Function (GWLF) was used to model the hydrological processes under the LULC conditions. We discuss spatio-temporal variations in LULC and identify factors contributing to these variations and analyze the corresponding impacts of the change on the hydrological processes like runoff, erosion and sedimentation. The simulated results on the hydrological responses reveal that depletion of the vegetation cover in the study area and increase in impervious and bare surface cover due to anthropogenic interventions are the primary reasons for the increased runoff, erosion and sediment discharges in the Dal lake catchment. This study concludes that LULC change in the catchment is a major concern that has disrupted the ecological stability and functioning of the Dal lake ecosystem.