Lightning kills more people in India than any other natural disaster, yet it continues to be treated as an understated threat because of its scattered and localised nature, experts warned at a national conference held in New Delhi.
Scientists, disaster management officials and meteorologists gathered at the 9th National Lightning Conference at Prithvi Bhavan on December 22, 2025, called for a stronger scientific understanding of atmospheric electricity, improved detection infrastructure and deeper community-level preparedness to further reduce lightning-related deaths.
Experts said that as the climate warms, thunderstorms are becoming more intense and frequent, leading to a rise in lightning strikes across the country. This makes it critical to develop more detailed models of thunderstorms that can better capture how atmospheric electricity is generated and how lightning behaves.
During the conference, the Annual Lightning Report 2024–25 was released by the Climate Resilient Observing Systems Promotion Council in collaboration with the India Meteorological Department and the Union Ministry of Earth Sciences. The report showed a sharp increase in lightning strikes across India, even as deaths have declined due to better early warning systems and awareness campaigns.
According to the report, lightning strikes increased by nearly 400 per cent between 2019 and 2025. At the same time, the geography of lightning is expanding, with new hotspots emerging in northern and western India, regions that were previously considered less vulnerable.
The report challenged earlier assumptions about lightning patterns. It found that eastern and central India record the highest number of cloud-to-ground lightning strikes, which also corresponds to the highest number of casualties. Sanjay Srivastava, principal scientist at CROPC and convener of the National Lightning Resilient India Campaign, said this explains why these regions continue to bear the greatest human cost.
Another major finding was the emergence of Rajasthan, Gujarat, Haryana, Punjab and Delhi as new lightning hotspots. This marks a shift in risk towards desert and semi-arid regions. The report also identified growing hotspots along the Kaimur and Satpura ranges, covering parts of Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh.
Seasonal analysis presented by IMD scientist Trisanu Banik showed that lightning spreads over a wider geographic area during the southwest monsoon compared to the pre-monsoon period. Western and north-western India experience more lightning during monsoon months, while the western peninsular region records higher activity before the monsoon sets in.
Between 2014 and 2025, Madhya Pradesh recorded the highest number of lightning-related deaths at 3,496, followed by Bihar with 3,041 deaths and Himachal Pradesh with 2,923, according to the report.
A district-level vulnerability analysis found that 207 districts face high lightning risk, 434 have moderate vulnerability and 132 have relatively low vulnerability. The analysis combined lightning strike data, mortality figures, climate indicators and socio-economic factors, using detection networks operated by the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology and the National Remote Sensing Centre.
The report also highlighted a surge in atmospheric electricity. As electric charge builds up in clouds, their moisture-holding capacity increases, leading to a direct link between lightning, extremely heavy rainfall and cloudbursts. Certain landforms, such as the rocky terrain of the Western Ghats and the limestone hills of Uttarakhand, were found to attract higher levels of atmospheric electricity.
Experts noted that early warning systems run by the IMD and the National Disaster Management Authority have already helped reduce fatalities. Alerts are issued through mobile applications such as Sachet, Mausam and Damini. However, they stressed that further improvements are needed.
Mrutyunjay Mohapatra, Director General of the IMD, said an effective lightning warning system must assess both the intensity of an event and the probability of its occurrence, which is now being addressed through a multi-model forecasting approach.
M Ravichandran, Secretary of the Ministry of Earth Sciences, said measuring atmospheric electric fields could provide much earlier warnings. He explained that when electric fields rise to around 100 volts per metre, there is a possibility of lightning striking the ground.
Calling for decentralised planning, former IMD Director General K J Ramesh said India needs district-specific lightning mitigation plans and specialised laboratories to test high-voltage detection equipment. He noted that detecting extremely high surges of atmospheric electricity requires advanced instruments that are currently lacking.
Several speakers emphasised that technology alone is not enough. Without community-level capacity building, early warning systems have limited impact. Rajendra Singh of the NDMA said warnings must be issued in local languages with clear instructions, adding that community-centred mitigation is essential.
Krishna S Vatsa of the NDMA described lightning as a “dispersed disaster” that cannot be addressed without interventions at the district and village levels. He said limited technical capacity at the state level remains a major challenge and called for wider coverage using basic detection devices at the Gram Panchayat level.