Beas, known as Vipas in the past, meaning the “Unfettered” river, originates at 4361 meters near Rohtang Pass and flows through the Himalayan state of Himachal Pradesh in India before meeting River Sutlej in the plains of Punjab, literally “the land of five rivers’. Beas flows for about 470 kilometers to water some of the most fertile valleys in the world. Though it is the smallest of the five rivers that meet the Indus, it is the lifeline of Himachal Pradesh and Punjab and has been exploited for irrigation and hydropower generation. The basin frequently faces climate-related disasters in the form of floods, landslides and avalanches.
