Ganga Nears Warning Mark in Varanasi; Boats Banned as All 86 Ghats Go Under

The Ganga at Varanasi climbed into the mid-69-metre band on Saturday, 22 August 2026, closing in on the Central Water Commission warning mark while remaining below the published danger level. District administration banned boat services. All 86 ghats stood submerged. Sheetla temple took floodwater, the Namaste sculpture at Namo Ghat sat half under the swell, and the Subah-e-Banaras stage at Assi went underwater.

Central Water Commission readings compiled for Saturday put the river near 69.15 metres around 8 am and near 69.18 metres later in the day. The warning mark stands at 70.26 metres. The danger mark is published at 71.26 metres (also cited as 71.262 metres). That left a gap of roughly a metre to the warning line on the morning figure, with the river still rising earlier at about one centimetre an hour in the same CWC-linked series.

The boat ban was a district call. An earlier CWC-linked reading near 68.74 metres had already framed the safety order; Saturday’s higher band kept the ban in force. Water police and National Disaster Response Force teams remained deployed along the riverfront, according to the district administration’s flood-watch posture.

District Magistrate Satyendra Kumar and Police Commissioner Mohit Agarwal had inspected stretches of the front as levels climbed through the week. Saturday’s story was the numbers and the ban, not a rewrite of Friday’s rooftop ritual squeeze. Cremation capacity at Manikarnika’s terrace was still reported at about seven pyres against a usual load above twenty, and Harishchandra rites continued to spill into lanes — secondary effects of the same flood stage, not the lead.

At Assi, the Subah-e-Banaras platform sat under water, cutting the morning civic-cultural stage that usually fronts the southern riverfront. Sheetla temple’s inundation added a temple-side marker to the same Saturday band. At Namo Ghat, the Namaste sculpture stood half-submerged, a clear visual of how far the bank had lost its dry apron.

River traffic stayed tied up. With every listed ghat under water, passenger boats had no workable embarkation line, and the ban removed any grey zone for operators tempted to push out against the current. Sawan crowds still moved through the city even as the steps disappeared under brown monsoon water.

CWC’s Saturday pair — about 69.15 metres at 8 am and about 69.18 metres in the later Saturday citation — sits well clear of the 71.26-metre danger mark and short of 70.26 metres warning. The administration’s message was precaution: boats off, NDRF and water police on the bank, and continuous watch as the river tracked upward by centimetres.

For Banaras residents who measure the monsoon by which temple plinth goes first, Saturday’s checklist was blunt — Assi stage gone, Sheetla wet, Namaste half under, eighty-six ghats counted as submerged. The warning mark was not crossed in the Saturday CWC figures used here. The danger mark remained more than two metres above the morning reading.

Boat services stayed banned under the district order as Saturday’s CWC band held near 69.15–69.18 metres, with Assi, Sheetla and Namo Ghat among the clearest markers of how high the river had climbed.