The region has been feeling smaller tremors which could be an indicator of the larger shocks coming and the recent Union Home Ministry’s disaster management experts warned of a bigger catastrophe, earthquakes with a magnitude of 8.2 or greater on the Richter Scale which may hit the already ruptured Himalayan region. The projections are that the quakes with higher intensity than the one that struck Manipur on Monday are likely to rock the region in future. Jammu and Kashmir has felt the impact of The Kashmir earthquake’ (also known as the South Asian earthquake or the Great Pakistan earthquake) of 2005, designated a major earthquake with its epicenter in the Pakistan-administered Kashmir registering a debatable 7.7 or 7.6 on the Richter Scale, the quake compares in intensity to the 1935 Quetta earthquake, the 2001 Gujarat earthquake and the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Nearly 1,400 people died in Jammu and Kashmir and fourteen in Afghanistan. Jammu and Kashmir lies in the area of collision of the Eurasian and Indian tectonic plates. The geological activity that precipitated the collision lay at the root of unstable seismicity in the region. The activity also has been responsible for the birth of the Himalayan mountain range. The tectonic shift which has caused a series of these recent earthquakes in the region — Manipur 6.7 (Jan 2016), Nepal 7.3 (May 2015) and Sikkim 6.9 (2011) — has re-ruptured the plates that had already developed cracks during previous temblors. This has led to conditions which might trigger multiple earthquakes which may go up to 8.0 in magnitude. In a post-Nepal disaster assessment, the MHA’s National Institute of Disaster Management (NIDM) has warned of enhanced risk around the “ring of fire garlanding the entire north India especially the mountains”. The most active Zone V comprises of the whole of north-east, parts of north Bihar, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, J and K, Gujarat and Andaman and Nicobar Islands. The warning are alarming especially in a state like Jammu and Kashmir where no master-plans exist for the construction of residential and commercial buildings and violations are visible openly.
