River, lake and haor, Netrokona
Someshwari Riverসোমেশ্বরী নদী
- Time needed
- An hour on the bank, two with a boat.
- best months
- Nov–Feb
The river that comes down from the Garo Hills past Ranikhong and Durgapur: clear water over pebbles and sand in winter, a torrent in the rains, boats, coal and sand gatherers, and the hills standing behind it.
Plan your visit
- Best time
- November to February for clear water and the sand roads; the rains to see it in spate from the bank.
At a glance
- Source
- Nokrek range, Garo Hills, Meghalaya (the Simsang)
- In Bangladesh
- About 50 km, from Ranikhong to the Kangsha
- Name
- After Someshwar Pathak, founder of Susang, by tradition
About
The Garo call it Simsang; in Meghalaya it is the biggest river of the hills, rising on the Nokrek range and cutting the Garo Hills in two before it drops into Bangladesh beside the Ranikhong hill. Tradition says it was renamed when Someshwar Pathak took the country in 1280. In Bangladesh it winds about 50 km south and east past Durgapur, Kumudganj and Kalmakanda to the Kangsha, with branches into the Sunamganj haors.
At Durgapur it is the whole landscape. In the dry months the river shrinks to channels across a wide bed of white sand and rounded stones, and the sand itself is a road: autos, motorcycles and lorries cross it to the Bijoypur side, villagers sieve it for coal and gravel washed down from the hills, and the water that remains is clear enough to see the stones. After rain in Meghalaya it rises in hours into a brown flood that takes the crossings with it. Either way the view upstream, to the first ridges of the Garo Hills, is why people stand on its bank.
Boats can be hired at the Durgapur ghat for a slow hour on the water, and the petrified wood sometimes found on its sands has made it a curiosity for geologists too.
Getting there: A few minutes' walk from Durgapur bazar or Birishiri; the main ghat is on the Durgapur side.
Things to do
- Walk out onto the sand bed in winter and look upstream to the hills.
- Take a boat from the Durgapur ghat.
- Watch the sand and coal gatherers at work.
Good to know
- Do not swim where sand or coal has been dug; the pits are deep and the current pulls.
- A flash flood can arrive on a sunny day; keep an eye on the water and the sky over Meghalaya.
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