Kedarnath disaster
Kēdārnāth Mandir (Kedarnath Temple) is one of the holiest Hindu temples dedicated to the god Shiva and is located on the GarhwalHimalayan range near the Mandakini river in Kedarnath, Uttarakhand in India. Due to extreme weather conditions, the temple is open only between the end of April (Akshay trutya) to Kartik Purnima (the autumn full moon, usually November) every year.
The temple is not directly accessible by road and has to be reached by a 14 kilometres (8.7 mi) uphill trek from Gaurikund. Pony and manchan service is also available. The temple is believed to have been built by Pandavas and revived by Adi Sankaracharya[2] and is one of the twelve Jyotirlingas, the holiest Hindu shrines of Shiva. Pandavas were supposed to have pleased Shiva by doing penance in Kedarnath. The temple is also one of the four major sites in India's Chota Char Dham pilgrimage of Northern Himalayas.
Kedarnath was the worst affected area during the 2013 flash floods in North India. The temple complex, surrounding areas and Kedarnath town suffered extensive damage, but the temple remained unharmed to a large extent.
The first hall inside the temple contains statues of the five Pandava brothers, Lord Krishna, Nandi, the vehicle of Shiva and Virabhadra, one of the guards of Shiva. Statue of Draupadi and other deities are also installed in the main hall. A medium sized conical rough stone formation is worhispped in the Garbagruha of Kedarnath temple and considered as Sadashiva form of Lord Shiva.[1]An unusual feature of the temple is the head of a man carved in the triangular stone fascia of the temple. Such a head is seen carved in another temple nearby constructed on the site where the marriage of Shiva and Parvati was held. Adi Shankara was believed to have revived this temple, along with Badrinath and other temples of Uttarakhand and he is believed to have attained mahasamadhi at Kedaranath. Behind the temple is the samādhi mandir of Adi Sankara.
Kedarnath flood
Uttarakhand disaster was result of extreme rains and haphazard development
From 14 to 17 June 2013, the Indian state of Uttarakhand and adjoining area received heavy rainfall, which was about 375 percent more than the benchmark rainfall during a normal monsoon.[12] This caused the melting of Chorabari Glacier at the height of 3800 metres, and eruption of theMandakini River[13] which led to heavy floods near Gobindghat, Kedar Dome, Rudraprayag district, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh and Western Nepal, and acute rainfall in other nearby regions of Delhi, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and some parts of Tibet.[14]
The upper Himalayan territories of Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand are full of forests and snow-covered mountains and thus remain relatively inaccessible. They are home to several major and historic Hindu and Sikh pilgrimage sites besides several tourist spots and trekking trails. Heavy rainfall for four consecutive days as well as melting snow aggravated the floods.[15] Warnings by the India Meteorological Department predicting heavy rains were not given wide publicity beforehand, causing thousands of people to be caught unaware, resulting in huge loss of life and property.[16] In the city of Dehra Dun, capital of Uttarakhand, this was the wettest June day for over five decades.
Although the Kedarnath Temple itself had not been damaged, its base was inundated with water, mud and boulders from the landslide, damaging its perimeter.[22] Many hotels, rest houses and shops around the temple in Kedarnath township were destroyed, resulting in several casualties. Most of the destruction at Kedarnath was caused by a sudden rapid melting of ice and snow on the Kedarnath Mountain, 6 km (3.7 mi) from the temple, which flooded the Charbari lake (upstream) and then Kedarnath. Temple was flooded with water resulting in several deaths due to drowning and panic-driven stampede.[26] The Uttarakhand Government announced that due to the extensive damage to the infrastructure, the temple will be temporarily closed to regular pilgrims and tourists for a year or two, but the temple rituals will still be maintained by priests.[27][28][29] Even after a week, dead bodies had not been removed from Kedarnath town, resulting in water contamination in the Kedarnath valley and villagers who depend on spring water suffered various types of health problems like fever, diarrhoea.[30] When the flood receded, satellite images showed one new stream at Kedarnath town.
Landslides, due to the floods, damaged several houses and structures, killing those who were trapped.[15] The heavy rains in large flashfloods and massive landslides.[14] Entire villages and settlements such as Gaurikund and the market town of Ram Bada, a transition point to Kedarnath, have been obliterated, while the market town of Sonprayag suffered heavy damage and loss of lives.[8][18] Pilgrimage centres in the region, includingGangotri, Yamunotri, Kedarnath and Badrinath, the hallowed Hindu Chardham (four sites) pilgrimage centers, are visited by thousands of devotees, especially after the month of May onwards. Over 70,000 people were stuck in various regions because of damaged or blocked roads.[15] People in other important locations like the Valley of flowers, Roopkund and the Sikh pilgrimage centre Hemkund were stranded for more than three days.[15]National Highway 58, an important artery connecting the region was also washed away near Jyotirmath and in many other places.[18] Because summers have more number of tourists, the number of people impacted is substantial.[19] For more than three days, stranded pilgrims and tourists were without rations or survived on little food.[20] The roads were seriously damaged at more than 450 places, resulting in huge traffic jams, and the floods caused many cars and other vehicles to be washed away.[15] On June 18, more than 12,000 pilgrims were stranded at Badrinath, the popular pilgrimage center located on the banks of the Alaknanda River.[21][22][23] Rescuers at the Hindu pilgrimage town of Haridwar on the river Ganga recovered bodies of 40 victims washed down by the flooded rivers as of June 21 2013.[24] Bodies of people washed away in Uttarakhand were found in distant places like Bijnor, Allahabad and Bulandshahr in Uttar Pradesh
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