Lahore and the Ravi — A Forgotten Love Story
When the Ravi surged through Lahore in August 2025 after years of silence, it was not just a flood. For many Lahoris it felt like an old friend returning — a reunion with the river that once gave life, songs, and stories to the city.
A river older than the city
Lahore grew beside the Ravi. The city’s origins are often traced back to Lava (Loh) and the site known as Lavpur; from the earliest Vedic texts the river (Iravati) was part of the Saptasindhu — the seven-river landscape that shaped Punjab’s earliest cultural imagination. For centuries the Ravi was more than water: it was playground, lifeline, battlefield and witness.
Legends and memory
Foundational folklore links Lahore to epic figures. Ballads and traditional accounts speak of combats and heroic deeds beside the Ravi — from the Dasarajna (Battle of Ten Kings) to tales of Raja Rasalu defeating demons in the forests once called Udinagar. These stories made the river central to Lahore’s identity: a city forged through waters, struggle and memory.
Ravi in religious imagination
The river is woven into Sufi and Sikh memory. The 16th-century mystic Shah Hussain (Madho Lal Hussain) was first buried on the Ravi bank; when floods moved his grave, devotees saw the river as protector and devotee alike. In Sikh tradition, the fifth Guru Arjan Dev completed his earthly life near the old Ravi wall by the fort in 1606 — an event commemorated at Gurdwara Dera Sahib and remembered as a moment when river and faith meet.
The disappearance and its pain
By the late 20th century the Ravi had been reduced by upstream diversions, dams and pollution to a thin, dark stream. Experts documented sharp declines in annual flows; bridges looked over dust rather than water. For Lahoris this was more than ecological loss — it was cultural bereavement. A city born on a river had been left with memory but no water.
The reunion of August 2025
Unprecedented monsoon rains and dam releases forced the Ravi back into the city in August 2025. The floods were among the largest in Punjab, displacing many people and causing destruction — yet Lahoris stood on bridges in awe. Families gathered to watch the swollen river and to touch waters they had only known from stories. For many the return felt like a resurrection of the city's memory.
Lesson and paradox
The river’s return exposed a truth: while the Ravi anchors Lahore’s identity, the city itself had crept into the floodplain. Housing schemes, real-estate projects and approvals inside flood-influence zones have placed people and property in harm’s way. Projects framed as development too often ignored ecological realities, and structures built atop former floodplain lands suffered heavily when the Ravi reclaimed its course.
A tour guide's wish
As a tour guide who knows Lahore’s forts, shrines and gardens, one can hope for a living Ravi — not as disaster nor as a polluted trickle, but as a healthy river that sustains life and memory. If Lahore can learn to respect its river and its floodplain, perhaps children will once again play on its banks, festivals will float lamps on its surface, and the city will see its reflection in running water — a true reunion of history, culture and life. Check our Lahore city tour
— Written for Travel-Culture by Jamal Panhwar
