The Ganga Morphology - The Ganga: Water Use in the Indian Subcontinent - page 36

photography, taken in 1964 and the topographical map of the area surveyed in 1914,
three positions of the Ganga were revealed in 50 years. The topographic survey
indicated that the river shifted by about 6 km west of the previous course, which is
now a deserted channel close to Bijnor terraces on the east. Aerial photographs in
1964 showed that the river had shifted further east by about 1 km from its course in
1914. The width of the flood-plain varies from 6 to 13 km in the north. Diversions
in the course took place within this broad flood-plain. The last significant change
in the main stream occurred after the 1953 flood, when it moved by some 2 km to
the west to Shukartar, touching Hastinapur. Nowhere else the Ganga is so close to
Hastinapur belt.
Alluvial terraces usually result from rejuvenation of a stream and consequent
formation of steep-sided and flat surfaces above the bed. It may be brought about
by increased gradient, either by tilting, or by increase in volume of water, or by
decrease in silt-load. In this zone, the Ganga underwent several phases of change,
filling its bed with sand-bars and islands, grown over with natural vegetation; this
slowly diminished its discharging capacity. This may cause another diversion in near
future, because if the Ganga cannot move further eastward, it is likely to move west,
which seems to have already started. Its entire flood-plain belt is marked by low and
elongated alluvial platforms, 2-6 m high, from the bed in dry season. Such plat-
forms are typical alluvial terraces, made of sediments suspended in water after the
flood recedes and deposits as levees on both banks, or as sand-bars in the river-bed.
Eventually, these levees and bars rise above normal flood-limit and form flood-plain
terraces which, in course of time, receive alluvium deposits, particularly during
exceptional high floods.
The upper Ganga flood-plain is an elongated fluvial tract, stretching along both
banks. Unlike adjoining old alluvium, the flood-plain has a more varied physical
history and a different mode of human leaving. The Ganga's oscillating nature and
its frequent high floods have lent dynamism to the natural and cultural landscape of
the tract. The present form and trend of its regime are only a stage in its long and
chequered history. The Burhiganga (literally,'Old Ganga') falls into it in numer-
ous channels. The Ganga's recession was noticed by Taimur Long who invaded the
region in 1398-1399 AD and mentioned in his mempor. Now a chain of swamps,
the Burhiganga entered Meerut district of Uttar Pradesh from Muzaffarnagar, near
Firozpur village and flowed southward to Garh Mukteswar where it joined the
Ganga. According to the Mahabharata, Hastinapur, the capital of Kauravas, stood
on the bank of the Ganga but no trace of it is seen now. It might have been washed
away by the river in the beginning of the Kali Yuga (a Hindu Puranic aeon, cor-
responding to the Iron Age) over 3000 years ago, i.e., around 1000 BC. Taimur
in his memoir mentioned Firozpur town as being on the right bank of the Ganga.
Firozpur village near Ramraj on the right bank of the Burhiganga corresponds with
Timur's Firozpur. If it is true, eastward recession of the Ganga from its old bed took
place by about 10 km after 1400 AD. Over the ages, its course oscillated along the
Burhiganga axis till about 1400 AD, after which it began to move eastward to its
present course, past Daranagar village.