Risk resilience of growing settlements in landslide prone hilly areas: case study on Kalimpong-I block, Darjeeling District, West Bengal

Darjeeling-Sikkim Himalaya is a hotspot of landslide occurrences in India. Losses of natural and human resources have become common and frequent news for this area due to landslides. At the same time, it’s a very potential zone from a developmental and tourism perspective which leads to emerging population growth and settlement expansion. The directional magnitude of this sprawling depends on the physical, environmental and infrastructural strengths of the area. But this can be threatened by landslides. Hence, to minimize loss of lives and property, optimizing and restricting developmental activities in highly sensitive areas is the need of the hour. Kalimpong is a highly sensitive site for such an issue for its emerging urban agglomeration. Hence, the case study was conducted in Kalimpong-I block in Darjeeling District. Quantitative simulation by multivariate logistic regression was carried out based on influencing factors and landslide inventory data for landslide susceptibility analysis. Digital elevation model (DEM), Landsat-8 OLI satellite imagery and some secondary data were used to generate the individual spatial database for formulating dependent variables. Spatial overlay analysis with the final outputs for predicted urban sprawling and predicted landslide occurrence zones enabled the managing authority to identify future highly vulnerable zones as well as safer zones for settlement and infrastructure expansion. This helped the authority to restrict the set-ups resulting minimization of elements at risk. It can help in the disaster preparedness as well as mitigation planning. Therefore, this study shows a holistic approach towards effective disaster management and risk resilience.