Ghaggar (the legendary Saraswati)

This is an inland drainage which rises in the talus fan of the Shiwaliks of Sirmur near Ambala (Haryana). After entering the plains, it disappears, but reappears at Karnal District (Fig. 3.8). Further on, the stream is called Hakra which gets lost near Hanumangarh in Bikaner. The considerably large size of this river bed, 5 to 8 kilometres wide, with the loamy soil in the river bed, led to the belief that in old times the Satluj flowed south through this Ghaggar-IIarka river instead of flowing southwestward (in the form of a much bigger river known as river Saraswati in Vedic literature, probably 5000 BC or earlier). This river is traced further on as Eastern Nara which is, at present, an old channel of the Indus in Sind (Pakistan), and flows into the Rann of Kachch which was described as a deep fairly gulf at that time. Al present, the entire area is practically a desert, and the Ghaggar-Hakra are practically ephemeral streams coming into flow only during the season of general rains.