The Malpa landslide was one of the worst landslides in

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

. On 18 August 1998 at 3.00 a.m., massive landslide wiped away the entire village of Malpa in the

Pithoragarh district Pithoragarh district is the easternmost district in the state of Uttarakhand. It is located in the Himalayas and has an area of and a population of 483,439 (as of 2011). The city of Pithoragarh, located in Saur Valley, is its headquarters. Th ...

Uttarakhand Uttarakhand (, ), also known as Uttaranchal ( ; List of renamed places in India, the official name until 2007), is a States and union territories of India, state in North India, northern India. The state is bordered by Himachal Pradesh to the n ...

, then in

Uttar Pradesh Uttar Pradesh ( ; UP) is a States and union territories of India, state in North India, northern India. With over 241 million inhabitants, it is the List of states and union territories of India by population, most populated state in In ...

in Kali Valley of Higher

Kumaon division Kumaon (; , ; historically romanised as KemāonJames Prinsep (Editor)John McClelland ) is a List of divisions in India, revenue and administrative division in the Indian state of Uttarakhand. It spans over the eastern half of the state and is b ...

of the

Himalayas The Himalayas, or Himalaya ( ), is a mountain range in Asia, separating the plains of the Indian subcontinent from the Tibetan Plateau. The range has some of the Earth's highest peaks, including the highest, Mount Everest. More than list of h ...

. The rockfall started on 16 August bringing down huge rocks which initially killed three mules. A total of 221 people died, including 60 Hindu pilgrims travelling to Tibet as part of "Kailash Manas Sarovar Yatra". One noted death was that of the Indian dancer Protima Bedi. The rockfall continued till 21 August. As the area lies in a

seismic zone In seismology, a seismic zone or seismic belt is an area of seismicity potentially sharing a common cause. It can be referred to as an earthquake belt as well. It may also be a region on a map for which a common areal rate of seismicity is assume ...

, the earthquakes of 1979 and 1980 may have been the underlying cause, as was attributed by a report of the Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology. Pithoragarh Panorama

Causes of landslide

The landslide generated around one million cubic meters of rock fall and debris flow. This debris partially blocked the

Sharda River The Sharda River is the downstream of Kāli River (or Mahakali River) that originates in the northern Uttarakhand state of India in the Great Himalayas on the eastern slopes of Nanda Devi massif, at an elevation of in the Pithoragarh distr ...

. The landslide prevailed mostly due to steep, almost vertical, slopes of rock above the valley. In addition to the slopes, the proximity of the rock mass to major tectonic plates, major rainfall into the porous rock, and stress on the rock formations all contributed to the landslide. Natural disasters in the area have been attributed to ″unplanned construction and urbanization on the fluvial and un-consolidated materials produced by

active fault An active fault is a fault that is likely to become the source of another earthquake sometime in the future. Geologists commonly consider faults to be active if there has been movement observed or evidence of seismic activity during the last 10,0 ...

s/thrusts in various sectors.″ The slide demonstrated the distressed state of rock in the Himalayan region because of the drift of the Indian plate northward.

References

Landslides in India 1998 disasters in India History of Uttarakhand (1947–present) Disasters in Uttarakhand 1990s landslides 1998 natural disasters Malpa {{Natural-disaster-stub