Sarasvati River - Course of Saraswati

Course of Saraswati

Palaeo-drainage network formed by several palaeochannels has been worked out by different researchers in western Rajasthan and neighbouring states, which is mainly buried under sand cover of the Thar Desert and parallel to the Aravalli Hills 6–8. In the last couple of years with the advancement in satellite and remote sensing technology, palaeochannels have been mapped systematically. Different workers have different opinions about the number of courses of Saraswati River. Ghosh et al.6,9 reported five, Yashpal et al.10 reported one, Bakliwal and Grover11 reported seven. On the basis of aerial photographs and Landsat imagery, faults/lineaments and palaeo-drainage system in NW India have been delineated6,7,9,12–15. Several authors16–18 have opined that upliftment of the Aravallis led to the westward migration of Saraswati River system due to fault-controlled movements. The faults have been and continue to be active, registering various sideways and up–down movements in the geological past. As a consequence, there was uplift and sinking or horizontal (lateral) displacement of the ground. Under such tectonophysiographic upheavals, the rivers and streams were frequently forced to change their courses, sometimes gradually, sometimes abruptly, as seen on satellite images.

As per Hindu beliefs, Saraswati river flows underground and meets Yamuna and Ganga at their confluence in Prayag (Allahabad).