by Aparna Guru

Created on: April 10, 2008

The complete disappearance of any river is not an easy thing to predict, because there may be a lot of factors pertaining to the extinction of a river. Setting aside the ill affects on the rivers caused by the growing human population and industrialization, there are also these geographical and natural factors, which can greatly affect and alter a river's current state including the earthquakes, floods, movements of tectonics plates or any unpredictable change of climate set to be occurred in the future.

As the history indicates, in 4000 B.C a great river naming Saraswati flowing in North-west India was completely disappeared. The current research and Satellite images predict the river to be flowing once from the Siwalik hill at the Himalaya foothills in Himachal Pradesh to the Arabian Sea. The research started on this river when an English engineer called CF Oldham firstly pointed out the unexpected wide bed of a small seasonal river in Rajasthan in 1893. This small river named Ghaggar, which is expected to be one of the tributaries of the river Saraswati has a valley of eight to twelve kilometers of width in Haryana. Most of the people in India believe the existence of Saraswati river because of its strong reference in the Vedas and the ancient Hindu mythology. Scientists and Geologists relate the extinction of this river to the major changes in tectonic plates around the Himalayan area thousands of years ago that cut off the supply of melting ice water from the source. The diversion of this river and the gradual separation from its tributaries left it with several lakes and pools those dried out eventually.

Presently the threat to any rivers' existence comes mainly from the irrepressible growth of human population and its affect on the environment. As the population increases, so is the demand for water. The major rivers in this world including Yangtze and Yellow river of China, Nile in Africa, North America's Rio Grande and the Ganges and Indus of south Asia all are badly affected by pollution and global warming. Yangtze river is supposed to be receiving half of China's industrial waste. Volga river in Russia is another example that is being polluted due to the large number of industries situated within its drainage. As the water gets polluted the marine life is suffering and the fish production deteriorating. In North America the depleting water level in Rio Grande and the percolation of salt water bringing in the ocean species that endanger the lives of

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