Living on the Margins

The devastating floods particularly in the two Himalayan states of India, Uttarakhand and Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), point to the centre of debates around human–environment relations and the issues of development and sustainability. To take it a step further, this chapter examines that the overwhelming impact of the 2013 Uttarakhand and the 2014 J&K deluges are generated from complex and diverse factors, namely the varying nature of hazards, the unresolved development challenges and the rising population exposure and limited adaptive capacity. Disaster for that reason is not an isolated event, rather it transpires at the crossing point of dynamic natural forces, rampant anthropogenic disturbances as well as acute societal-induced vulnerability and is essentially the results of the relations of these interactions.