Rescue and relief measures for those hit by floods across Pakistan need to be expedited as people are dying helplessly. The social media footage showed five friends trapped in the middle of a river in the Kohistan area, and later on, four of them vanished in the strong current of the flood. The image would remain haunting the people. Almost all parts of Pakistan – the four provinces, Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan – have been under severe weather-infested calamities for over three weeks after the rainfalls broke a 30-year-old record with an estimated 600 per cent more rains creating torrential floods. Heavy and continuous rains and the resulting floods have destroyed both urban and rural settlements. The government is calculating the losses, and so far more than 1,000 people, including 326 children, have been killed, and more than 500,000 houses destroyed, rendering more than 10 million people homeless. The floodwater has submerged 2,886 highways – 3,000 kilometres of roads and 129 bridges, cutting off Balochistan from other parts of the country. Similarly, rail traffic has been suspended due to damage to rail tracks in Sindh and Balochistan. The natural calamity has created food security issues as wheat stocks were damaged and in Sindh alone, according to Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah, 90% of standing crops were destroyed. The worst affected parts by floods and rainfalls are the entire Sindh and Balochistan and to a large extent Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Dera Ghazi Khan division of Punjab. An emergency had to be imposed in many districts in Punjab. Balochistan’s land connection with Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is currently cut off and traffic with Punjab is also not normal, Quetta-Karachi national highway is closed. Nawab Shah Airport has also been closed due to water entering the runway. Many districts in all four provinces have been declared disaster-prone and the army has been called in for relief activities in Sindh. In Balochistan, the army is also engaged in rescue and relief work for flood victims. Thousands of flood-affected people are stranded and even food items cannot reach them due to lack of access. The federal and provincial governments are providing maximum assistance to the victims, but their resources are limited. Sindh has run out of tents. Federal and provincial governments have established relief funds to collect donations from home and abroad.
It is high time that Instead of playing politics on the calamity, political parties had better leave differences aside and reach out to the flood victims. This is the height of brutality and indifference, political uncertainty has already left the country in the quagmire of economic woes and the loss of lives and property caused by the unusual rains and flooded rails has made the situation more serious. In such a situation, the country’s political leadership is embroiled in a power struggle. Making cases against each other and venomous rhetoric has become a daily routine. There is a need to worry about the country at this time and pay attention to the people who are devastated by rains, floods, inflation and unemployment.
