Geomorphological evidences of fluctuations of the Bara Shigri Glacier in the Himachal Himalaya, India under Global Climate Change

Characteristic geomorphological evidences, preserved around the snout of the Bara Shigri Glacier in the district of Lahaul-spiti in the Himachal Himalaya, suggest that this glacier underwent successive stages of fluctuation during its retreat after a considerable surge in the Little Ice Age under climatic deterioration. Three sets of conspicuous retreat moraines with varying sizes and extensions have been identified and interpreted. Fresh lateral and terminal moraines, extending from the snout of the glacier down to the Chandra River bed for a distance of about four kilometres, suggest that the maximum advance during the Little Ice Age took place down to that position and formed a temporary shallow lake to the west of the existing morainic ridge which dammed the Chandra River. The study also reveals that in the present day the glacier is shrinking alarmingly under the Global Climate Change. Occurrence of fresh hummocky morainic drift in the foreground of the retreating snout has been attributed to this contemporary rapid retreat of the glacier.