Himalayan Rivers (Indian Drainage).
Syllabus: UPSC Pre GS1: Indian & World Geography; Mains GS1
Indus Waters Treaty for UPSC: Indus system, eastern and western rivers, India's rights, Indus Commission, Kishenganga and Ratle, and the 2025 abeyance.
On 5 October 2026 a barge with 540 tonnes of methanol from Assam Petro-Chemicals, Namrup, left Bogibeel terminal in Dibrugarh for Dhaka. It travels about 768 km on National Waterway-2 and then the Indo-Bangladesh Protocol Route, about 1,300 km in all. It is the first cargo from upper Assam to a foreign port since 1947.
UPSC angle: Prelims: NW-2, IBPR, places. · Mains GS-III: inland waterways; GS-II: India-Bangladesh.
5 Oct 2026
A study by the Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeosciences, reported by DST on 10 September 2026, measured magnetic minerals in sediments of Bakhira Lake in Sant Kabir Nagar, UP, to track 25,000 years of Indian Summer Monsoon change. Bakhira is an oxbow wetland of the Rapti and a Ramsar site since 2022. The record can improve monsoon models.
UPSC angle: Prelims: places in news (Bakhira).
10 Sep 2026
Scientists of the Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeosciences, Lucknow, reconstructed nearly 4,000 years of climate and vegetation history of Majuli, Assam, the DST said on 1 June 2026. Using pollen and grain size from a 150 cm sediment core of Sakali Wetland, they traced a warm, humid early phase, the Medieval Climatic Anomaly and the Little Ice Age.
UPSC angle: Prelims: Majuli.
1 Jun 2026
At a Brahmaputra Board review in Guwahati, the Centre outlined a nearly ₹4,800 crore Northeast inland waterways pipeline over five years. Brahmaputra is NW-2, linking Assam to Kolkata/Haldia via the Indo-Bangladesh Protocol Route. Assam has about ₹751 crore completed and over ₹1,100 crore ongoing. National waterway cargo rose from 18 MMT in 2014 to over 218 MMT in 2025-26.
UPSC angle: Prelims: national waterways.
19 May 2026