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Journalism of Courage
Growing up in Dharali village, Birodh Singh helped his father on their three-acre apple orchard. It was the perfect place to be — the pristine Bhagirathi on one side, the Kheer Ganga, its tributary, on the other.
Tall deodar trees ringed the orchard, beyond which was an expanse of green that, over the years, would be built upon recklessly. Near the orchard was the Kalp Kedar mandir, which, depending on who you spoke to, was built a few hundred years ago or by the Pandavas of the Mahabharata.
At 13, Singh would turn the soil over, plant new apple saplings, nurture the existing trees and spend lazy afternoons biting into the fruit and catching a siesta.
On August 5, Dharali was struck by flash floods in three consecutive waves, wiping out homes and washing away over 60 people. It was the first of two big flash floods to strike in the space of two weeks — days after, on August 14, nearly 900 km away, a similar tragedy unfolded in Jammu and Kashmir’s Kishtwar district.
In Dharali, the first tide of debris was accompanied by a loud crash, and people surrendered to nature’s fury. More tides of mud and debris returned, this time far quieter, as they swallowed humans, mules, houses and hotels, and, with these, the very memory of the village. Only the old settlements survived — the ones located away from the soft alluvial fan, the deposit from an earlier flood.
The Kheer Ganga — angry, wounded and grey with slush — has reclaimed its wetlands, where, until weeks ago, stood homes, hotels and shops, the result of frenzied construction to cater to an ever growing rush of tourists. For a few hours, the bend of the river changed. Now, 10 days after the floods, rescuers of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) continue to look for remains of the people and places that made up Dharali.
“It’s almost as if my orchard never existed. The orchard was my family’s only source of income. I don’t even have photos of the 300 trees I had,” says Birodh, sitting on a bench along the highway to Gangotri that now lies broken and buried under metres of slush.
“I got three of my daughters married from the income from the orchard. I have nothing now,” says Birodh.
As he speaks, Birodh makes space on the bench for Kushal Singh Panwar.
Kushal and friends
Kushal has stuck to a routine for as long as he can remember: wake up at 5 am, head straight to his apple orchard and, around 9 am, leave for the market, at the heart of which stood his 11-room hotel. After a round of stocktaking, he would walk over to the hotel owned by Mukesh ‘Munna’ Panwar.
On August 5, both the hotels were washed away — and with that, the only life Kushal had known.
“Mukesh’s hotel was the village adda (hangout spot). It’s gone. All the young men I knew (Mukesh, Shubham Negi and Akash Panwar) are gone too,” he says.
Mukesh was with his wife Vijaita and their three-year-old son Anik were at their hotel when the floods swept through Dharali. All three of them are among the 68 people still missing. Mukesh’s elder son, six-year-old Adhiksh, was at their home in Uttarkashi, nearly 80 km from the village, so he could go to school that day.
Kushal says Mukesh was not supposed to be in Dharali that day. “The family stayed in Uttarkashi. Mukesh would come to Dharali only during the tourist season. He was rarely here between July and September. This time, they had come for the village mela. I went to Mukesh’s hotel a day before the floods and met the family. The little boy was so happy,” he recalls.
Nearly 60 km away, in Gawana village of Uttarkashi district, Mukesh’s elder son, six-year-old son Adhiksh, refuses to leave his uncle Ashok Chauhan’s arms. The boy whimpers, as if in pain, as Ashok tries to put him in his nani (maternal grandmother) Ujala Devi’s lap.
“I had seen a video of the disaster and hoped that Vijaita had left the village. When my mother said she was still in Dharali, I knew instantly that Vijaita was gone. Her hotel had been swept away. No one stands a chance in a disaster like that.”
Still sitting hunched on the bench, Kushal turns philosophical — everyone’s responsible for the tragedy and yet, no one. “We are to be blamed for what happened, so is the government. Had these hotels been built at least 30 metres from the river and the channel, the scale of the catastrophe may have been smaller. But then, what else can you do here? There are no other employment opportunities, so if one enterprise is successful, others follow,” he says. “That’s why so many of us — Mukesh, Shubham (Negi) and Akash (Panwar) — ran hotels here in Dharali. Now they are all gone.”
The search for Shubham
Shubham Negi was at his hotel for a “youth collective meeting” with friends Akash Panwar, Sumit Negi, and Gaurav Panwar when the floods hit.
At Shubham’s house in Dharali, his wife Komal, 28, says they were childhood sweethearts. “We were friends in school and then he moved to another school. We started dating in 2015. We had our share of fights and heartbreaks, but, through it all, he was my best friend,” she says.
Komal says that when they decided to marry, her family objected since they belonged to different castes. “His family agreed, but my parents did not attend my wedding. They gave in eventually. We got married in January 2024. All I am left with are Shubham’s memories and photos,” she says.
The recovery of Akash’s body on August 6 had confirmed the family’s worst fears about the fate of the other three. However, Komal says she is still holding on to hope that Shubham would have managed to get to some place safely. In fact, after Akash’s body was recovered, Komal fought with the administration and hopped on a helicopter to Harsil to look for Shubham there.
“I visited the spot he would go to everyday in Dharali. Two days ago, I spotted a few men sleeping under a rock near a temple in the village. I lifted the blanket, hoping I would find Shubham. I went to the spot where his hotel stood. I asked the NDRF to use their detectors to scan the debris. But they said it won’t work if the debris is deep. I will not give up until I see him or his body,” says Komal.
On August 13, she went back to the site of Shubham’s hotel. “I found a black hoodie near his hotel. He was wearing a black hoodie that day, but this was a different one,” she says.
A week after the incident, when someone suggested that the government might declare all missing persons dead, Komal was furious. “I will not let them give me a death certificate before they find something. How can the government say they need to rebuild roads before they bring in heavy machines to clear the debris? Does it take two weeks to build roads?,” she says, holding back tears.
Other lost memories
The highway to Gangotri that ran through Dharali doesn’t exist; in its place is a stream. Large boulders cover what was once a salon in the village run by Rakesh Thakur. Locals say it was the rendezvous point for all the migrants, most of them, like Rakesh, from Bihar. The Kalp Kedar temple, too, was central to their lives. It now lies in ruins, with many feared trapped inside.
Of the 68 missing people, 13 are workers from Bihar.
Every Janmashtami, a group of 45 migrant workers would assemble at the temple to prepare a bhog (feast) for the entire village. It was a practice that Devraj Sharma, a carpenter from Bihar, started years ago. Devraj and his two sons are among the men from Bihar who are among the missing.
Dharali cannot move on without the temple being restored. It was here that the village assembled for daily aarti at 6 pm. It’s also where the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) held their medical camps.
The ITBP, which holds its medical camps on the village temple premises, was among the first responders when the floods struck.
Among its many personnel is Dr Archana, an Assistant Commandant Medical Officer. Deployed at the ITBP’s Uttarakhand headquarters in Nelong Valley, around 40 km from Dharali, since July 2024, the Haryana resident is the only healthcare link for Dharali, Mukhwa, Harsil, and Bagori villages. Though a primary healthcare centre runs out of Mukhwa, 3 km away, villagers prefer to flock to her office for their health needs.
On August 5, hours after the floods, Dr Archana reached the village around 4 pm. From sutures to assisting pregnant women, she tended to all.
From Dharali, the victims were rushed to the ITBP’s Kopang outpost, around 8 km away. While administering first aid, her mind was occupied by thoughts of the priests at the Kalp Kedar temple. “Whenever we held a camp at the temple, they would feed me, help me with errands. When it was time for the 6 pm aarti, I would join them. I have yet to hear back from them,” she says.
Scrolling through her phone, she stops at a picture of her at the temple, playing with two dogs. “I thought the flood had hit only a few structures. By the time I reached Dharali, the entire village was under mud,” she says.
These days, Dr Archana spends hours checking her patient records. “I don’t have everyone’s contact numbers but I am checking my records for other names so I can find out if they are safe,” she says.
Another day at Dharali, at a rescue site, sudden barks from a cadaver canine put the ITBP personnel on high alert. “Is there something over there?” asks an onlooker, as rescuers dig, only to unearth a mule’s carcass.
“This could take weeks,” says a rescuer, getting back to digging.
