Abstract
Floods and droughts are intensifying and increasingly co-occurring under hydroclimatic variability, yet vulnerability assessments typically consider these extremes in isolation, masking compounded risks. Here, we develop a unified framework to quantify district-scale vulnerability to floods, droughts, and their combined impacts across India. Central to the framework is the Multi-Hazard Vulnerability Index (MHVI), supported by a bivariate vulnerability classification that explicitly captures overlapping susceptibilities to opposing hydrological extremes. Applying the framework for 2001 and 2011 reveals a substantial escalation of vulnerability, with highly flood-vulnerable districts increasing from 16.5% to 21.4% and drought-vulnerable districts from 10.6% to 18.1%, alongside a growing concentration of multi-hazard hotspots in eastern and northern India. The results demonstrate pronounced spatial and temporal shifts in compound vulnerability, highlighting regions where development gains are increasingly exposed to multi-hazard risks. The scalable framework offers a robust basis for risk-informed adaptation planning, resource prioritization, and climate-resilient disaster risk reduction.
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Acknowledgements
The authors greatly acknowledge the Census of India and World Bank repositories for providing the detailed information of various demographic, socio-economic, and physical indicators at the district scale. The work presented here is supported by the Department of Science & Technology (Integrated Centre for Adaptation to Climate Change, Disaster Risk Reduction and Sustainability (ICARS)-IIT Roorkee); Project No. DST-2211-WRC/23-24 sanctioned by DST (OM No DST/CCP/NMSKCC/CoE/236/2024(G)]. Additionally, we appreciate the support from the Department of Water Resources Development and Management at the Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee for the computational resources provided for this study.
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Tripathy, P., Thakur, D.A., Hari, V. et al. From single to compound hazards: how flood and drought vulnerabilities have intensified across India.
npj Nat. Hazards (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s44304-026-00264-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s44304-026-00264-x
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