The Soan River

The Swaan river cuts through Himalayan hills and creates many gorges, one of them is here. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Soan (Urdu: سون) (preferred), Sawaan (Urdu: سواں), Sawan or Sohan River is a river in Punjab, Pakistan.

Location and geography

The Soan River is an important stream of the Pothohar region of Pakistan. It drains much of the water of Pothohar. It starts near a small village Bun in the foothills of Patriata and Murree. It provides water to Simly Dam, which is the water reservoir for Islamabad. Near Pharwala Fort it cuts through a high mountain range, a wonderful natural phenomenon called Soan Cut. No stream can cut such a high mountain, which proves that the Soan was there before the formation of this range. And as the mountain rose through millions of years, the stream continued its path by cutting the rising mountain. Ling stream, following a relatively long course through Lehtrar and Kahuta falls in the Soan near Sihala on southern side of Village Gagri/Bhandar.

Islamabad Highway crosses this stream near Sihala where the famous Kak Pul bridge is constructed over it. The Ling Stream joins the Soan river just before the Kak Pul. Another famous stream, the Lai stream, joins this stream near Soan Camp. After following a tortuous path along a big curve, the stream reaches Kalabagh proposed Dam Site close to Pirpiyahi where it falls into the Indus river. There is a famous railway station by the name of Sohan and a beautiful railway bridge very close to it. This relatively small stream is more than 250 kilometers long. Due to its mountainous course and shallow bed, it is hardly used for irrigation purposes. Rohu is the main species of fish in this stream and Kingfisher birds hunt here too.

  History

The river might be the Sushoma River of the Rig Veda. According to the major Vedic religious work Srimad Bhagavatam, the Sushoma is one of the many transcendental rivers flowing to the north of the land of Bharata.^[1]