ISLAMABAD: Recent heavy rainfall in Pakistan’s north left 264 people dead and 3,000 homes partially or completely destroyed, the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) said on Friday.

The NDMA’s response director, Khuda Baksh, told the National Assembly Standing Committee on Climate Change that the rains triggered 120 landslides. The Karakoram Highway was blocked for nearly two weeks, forcing the authorities to turn to the armed forces for rescue operations and to deliver goods to inaccessible areas.

According to the NDMA official, the Pakistan Meteorological Department had warned of “abnormal” wet weather in March and April. The rainfall caused flash floods and landsliding in Gilgit-Baltistan (GB), Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Azad Kashmir. The worse of the two spells began on April 2.

Read: Rains, flash floods cause havoc in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa

Rains also triggered 120 landslides, NDMA’s response director Khuda Baksh informs NA body

He said 264 people were also injured during two spells of heavy rainfall, between March 9 and March 27 and April 2 and April 5.

The Orakzai coal mine also collapsed due to heavy rainfall in March, trapping 33 workers – seven of whom were killed. It took nearly 30 hours of joint rescue operations to save the remaining workers.

An avalanche in Chitral buried nine children, and two large landslides in Das and Kyal, GB, blocked the Karakoram Highway from April 3 to April 15.

Relief operations were carried out by the Pakistan Air Force, with C-130s flying 23 sorties to transport over 100 tons of relief goods.

“The Danna landslide in AJK in April...damaged 113 houses completely, and another 93 partially,” Mr Baksh told the meeting.

Syed Ahmed Akif, the climate change ministry secretary, told the committee members that the concerned departments lacked coordination.

He said coordination would remain poor under the present circumstances, with the NDMA working under the climate change ministry, the Flood Commission under the water and power ministry, and provincial disaster management authorities operating independently. “There must be a centralised organisation with complete focus on how best to deal with natural disasters,” Mr Akif said.

Deforestation

Members of the standing committee on climate change blamed provincial forest departments for the unstoppable deforestation in the country.

PML-N MNA Malik Ihtebar Khan said: “Close down these forest departments, and deforestation will be reduced significantly.”

Officials from provincial environment departments attempted to persuade the committee that tree plantations were effective, but the committee members argued that while their claims were probably correct on paper, the picture on the ground suggested otherwise.

“Trees are being cut as if it is the only business in the country,” PML-N MNA Mohammad Moeen Wattoo said. He accused forest departments of doing more damage to forest cover than the timber mafia.

While members took turns to criticise the forest departments and their officials, the climate change ministry’s Inspector General Forest Mahmood Nasir hinted in not so many words that elected members were responsible, for backing the timber mafia as well as creating drought-like conditions along river banks by building embankments to protect their agricultural lands, redirecting water flows and leaving trees to dry up.

Forest cover in Pakistan is currently a measly 5pc, and Pakistan is among the 55 countries categories as Low Forest Cover Countries (countries with less than 10pc forest area). The average rate of deforestation in 2004 was estimated to be 27,000 hectares per year.

Published in Dawn, April 30th, 2016