Srinagar, Aug. 27 -- The monsoon has come back like a verdict.

In the western Himalaya, rain is never only rain. It is history, judgment and warning.

These past weeks, cloudbursts and flash floods have torn through Jammu's Kishtwar, Doda, and Ramban, and surged north into Anantnag, Srinagar, Ganderbal, Kupwara and Baramulla. Roads have cracked, bridges sagged, homes washed away.

The Jhelum crossed danger marks at Sangam, hovered near alert levels in Srinagar, and pushed people back into the unease they felt in 2014, when two million were stranded.

Every monsoon, the story sounds the same: intense rain, sudden surge, landslide, closed highway, stranded villages, and frantic evacuations.

Yet each season also shows us the deeper ledger:...