Climate change is characterized by an increment in the mean temperature as well as increase in the variability around the means that cause extreme events such as changing monsoon patterns which lead to cyclones, floods and drought.
In 2005, India recorded highest flood frequency with around 140 floods affecting nearly 69 districts. In 2019, the districts affected rose to 151. After 2005, more than 55 Indian districts went through extreme flood events year after year, exposing 97.51 million people yearly. The frequency of associated monsoon events for example landslides, heavy rainfall, hailstorms, thunderstorms and cloudbursts increased 20 folds between 1970 and 2019 (Mohanty, 2020).
In the past ten decades over 79 districts recorded severe events like flood prone regions converting to drought prone regions and vice-versa has taken place in around 40 percent of the districts in India. It was reported that the shifting trend of regions converting from floods to droughts were comparatively higher than the regions that have shifted from droughts to floods.
The reasons could be the microclimatic alterations across the Indian subcontinent being triggered by localized changes in the climate.
Floods occurring in Maharashtra and Bihar, landslides and cloudbursts in Himachal Pradesh, intense rainfall in two districts of Goa and Uttarakhand indicate the rising frequency of the extreme weather events across the Indian landscape. Researchers and climate scientists warn that it’s no longer possible to ignore the climate change footprint and it is going to be integrated as a part of our daily routine. The Germany’s Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research predicted that the monsoon rains could increase in further as the global temperature increases.
Climate change is taking monsoons to a more chaotic side in India. For every degree Celsius of global warming, the rains are likely to rise by 5 percent. The monsoon dynamics is being dominated by climate change in the 21st century. This climate change is causing unpredictable extreme weather events. The real matter for concern is the socio-economic well-being of India. These extreme weather events are posing serious threats to agriculture as well as economy in the nation. This certainly should be a wakeup call for the policy makers not just in India but all around the world to contribute on their parts in bringing down the greenhouse gas emissions globally.
Deforestation and rapid urbanization, along with the fragile nature of Western Ghats has resulted into rockslides and severe destruction. Global warming increases the moisture holding capacity of air leading to the formation of intense cumulonimbus clouds. These clouds bring in incessant downpour in and around the nearby regions. Moreover, during an unstable atmosphere, such clouds keep on regenerating themselves thereby turning into a series of cloud development triggering incessant rainfall.
Weather turns out to be more sensitive in the hilly areas since mountains show a rapid response to climate change. In the Himalayas, continuous deforestation and the construction of hydropower plants, hotels and roads have caused soil loosening which is showing up now as frequent landslides even with the slightest of rains. When the formation of cumulonimbus clouds takes place in the absence of strong upper air winds, they become heavy and do not tend to travel long distance. These trapped clouds then deplete all their water over that specific region, and the event is known as ‘cloud burst.’
Various studies conducted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), have predicted that the coming years would be extremely wet and the threat lies largely over the well-being of people, agro-economy and the food system. These weather events are not only occurring in India, but major parts of Europe and China are also witnessing such extreme scenarios. Hence, we can conclude that it is not just the developing nations, but also the industrialized nations such as Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands, hit by climate change. Adequate preparation and mitigation techniques to deal with such events is the need of the hour, which is now!
Aakansha holds a master's degree in biotechnology and is currently working as a research scholar. An avid reader, Aakansha finds keen interest in reading and writing on areas related to clean energy and zero carbon emissions.
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