The recent thunderstorm with hail and lightning has killed over 126 people in north and eastern India between April 10 and April 12, as per news reports. Eighty people died in Bihar alone and the state government has announced a compensation of Rs 4 lakh each for the bereaved families. Deaths have also been reported from Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand, Delhi, Chhattisgarh and Odisha.
Lightning and thunderstorms, in recent times, have emerged as one of the most challenging hazards in India. There has been a rise in intensity, frequency and dimension of lightning flashes globally, and in the country.
A new research study shows how the type of landuse plays a significant role in the density of lightning strikes. This research, conducted jointly by Pune-based Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology under the Ministry of Earth Sciences, Hemvati Nandan Bahuguna Garhwal University in Uttarakhand, and Banaras Hindu University in Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, was published recently in the Journal of Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics, in March 2025.
According to the study, areas with lots of human activity, like farmlands and cities, have more lightning strikes. The reason being that without vegetation covering it around the year, the ground over these areas heats up quickly, creating the perfect conditions for thunderstorms. Similarly, cities trap heat and this leads to a rise in temperature.
Genesis of a thunderstorm is dependent on four broad factors. They are intense heat, moisture availability, instability in the atmosphere, and a trigger (could be a Western Disturbance or a jet stream).
The joint study also shows that the annual lightning flashes are high in the north India region compared to the northeast India region; with a peak during monsoon period in the former region, whereas peaks in the latter were found to be during pre-monsoon months.
Land use land cover increase lightning activity
“The impact of LULC [land use land cover] on lightning activity is evident in both the study regions. In both the regions, human-induced landscapes such as croplands, urban built-up areas consistently show high lightning activity due to favourable thermodynamic and microphysical conditions,” explains the study titled Influence of land use land cover and topography on lightning distribution over north and north-east Indian region.
Research also found that “natural landscapes such as forest, grasslands show moderate lightning activity while savannas and permanent wetlands show high lightning activity showing that vegetation helps in maintaining high soil moisture which may play a significant role in lightning occurrences.”
Topography also significantly influenced lightning occurrence, with higher flash rates in foothill areas due to surface heating and moisture convergence, and in Meghalaya, due to orographic lifting (As airflow encounters a mountain or hill, it is forced to rise; this is referred to as orographic lift).
This recent study is based on spatio-temporal variation of lightning characteristics over north India and north-east India between 2001 and 2014. Lightning flashes detected by Lightning Imaging Sensor (LIS) on board the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite were analysed for different LULC classes measured by Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) and elevation data from Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM).
“We found the positive lightning trends in areas of expanding agriculture and urbanization highlighting the role of LULC change in the lightning distribution over both the regions,” conclude the researchers.
Rising lightning strikes in India
According to a paper by Sanjay Srivastava, Chairperson of Climate Resilient Observing Systems Promotion Council (CROPC), and Convener of Lightning Resilient India Campaign, studies by CROPC and India Meteorological Department (IMD) show a 57 per cent rise in lightning in the country between April 2019 and March 2024.
According to him, with a 1 degree Celsius rise in temperature, the rise in lightning in the country has risen from 7 per cent to 18 per cent. Other reasons attributed are environmental degradation, rampant emission, pollution leading to a rise in aerosol levels, depletion of water bodies, deforestation, urbanisation, fast industrialisation and creation of heat islands in cities.
Climate change is fueling an alarming increase in deadly lightning strikes in India, claim researchers. The frequency of lightning is increasing due to rising global temperatures, unleashing a cascade of extreme weather events. Simply put, higher air temperatures create more water vapour, which after cooling at altitude, create electric charges that spark lightning.
A study by researchers of Fakir Mohan University, Balasore, Odisha, shows that between 1967 and 2020, lightning killed 101,309 people, with a sharp rise in casualties between 2010 and 2020. Almost one-third of deaths have taken place between 2010 and 2020.
Almost 50 per cent of the fatalities have been reported from central India, followed by northeast India (19 per cent), north India (18 per cent) and south peninsular India (13 per cent). This study was published last year in the international journal of Environment, Development and Sustainability.
Lighting deaths in India
The data from the Accidental Deaths and Suicides in India, National Crime Record Bureau (NCRB), shows that more than 2,000 people in India lose their lives annually from lightning, as noted in a March 2020 research paper. The state-wise casualties’ as documented in this study shows that maximum casualties are reported in Madhya Pradesh (313 deaths), Maharashtra (281 deaths) and Odisha (255 deaths) on an average per annum.
The favourable climatic conditions, such as availability of moisture content, unstable atmosphere and strong convection, cause severe cases of lightning over the regions of Orissa and Maharashtra.
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