Srinagar, Dec. 1 -- In a landmark shift with direct implications for Jammu & Kashmir, the Union Territory has been placed in India's newly created highest-risk seismic Zone VI, according to a radical overhaul of the country's earthquake hazard map released by the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS). The reclassification, issued under the revised Earthquake Design Code, marks the strongest official acknowledgement yet of the extreme tectonic stresses underlying the Himalayan region.

With the updated map, the entire Himalayan stretch from J&K to Arunachal Pradesh has now been grouped under Zone VI-an unprecedented move that unifies the mountain arc under a single, severe-risk category. Scientists say the change corrects earlier inconsistencie...