Trek to Himalayan shrines.

"At least 60 people have been killed and dozens are still missing after flash floods hit a village hosting Hindu pilgrims in Indian-administered Kashmir." "More than 100 have been injured," as "water mixed with debris and mud came gushing down a hill in Choshti village in Kishtwar district - a remote village on a busy pilgrimage route to a Himalayan shrine." ET. On 16 June 2013, a flash flood at the Hindu pilgrimage town of Kedarnath in Uttarakhand killed an estimated 6,054 people, including 934 local residents. wikipedia. In July 2025, "Heavy rainfall in Uttarakhand has triggered a series of landslides and flash floods, severely disrupting the Char Dham Yatra (four shrines' trek)." India Today. The Char Dham, or the four shrines, include Yamunotri, source of the River Yamuna, Gangotri, source of the River Ganga, Badrinath, temple to Lord Vishnu and Kedarnath, temple to Lord Shiva. Uttarakhand govt. "In 2021, another flood near Badrinath,..left more than 200 dead. Not too far away, slow-moving subsidence in Joshimath, a gateway to Badrinath, has left a fifth of buildings uninhabitable." "With less than 1% of India's population, the state of Uttarakhand consistently uses up about 10% of the country's budget for natural disaster relief," wrote David Fickling. "There's also the a larger and scarier question lurking in the events of land-subsidence at Garhwal's Joshimath town - are there other Joshimaths in the making across India's troubled hillscapes.""A construction boom with scant regulations, often under pressure of burgeoning tourism, finds echo across the Himalayan region." TOI. Tourists bring money into the local economy so governments are reluctant to control the number of tourists for fear of upsetting their 'vote bank' (wikipedia). Unscrupulous builders are lured in by tourist spending and build hotels on fragile slopes, ignoring warnings about landslides, while politicians and officials enrich themselves with bribes. Environmental degradation is rampant because of endemic corruption. "EY's recent 'Shadow Economy Exposed' report says India's underground or unaccounted economy was over 26% of GDP in 2023." There are "Sand mafia, tanker mafia, parking mafia, coal mafia, slum mafia to name a few." "Recently, Haryana's chief secretary got a rap from the Supreme Court over the illegal construction of a road through forestland for transporting illegally quarried stone from Haryana to Rajasthan. Later, a drone survey revealed not one but three unauthorised roads in the area." TOI. In 2015, Mr Nitish Kumar became Chief Minister of Bihar for the fifth time by promising to ban alcohol to get women's votes. TOI. Unable to sell locally brewed toddy, people chopped down palm trees. As a result, between April 2016, when the alcohol ban came into effect, and April 2025, lightning strikes have killed 2,446 people in Bihar. The sap-filled palm tree acts like a lightning rod. TOI. Human sacrifice. For religion. Or for votes.