DERA GHAZI KHAN: Heavy rainfall and ensuing hill torrents in Dera Ghazi Khan, Rajanpur and in Sulaiman Range inundated vast areas on Wednesday. The bazaars and streets of Taunsa city present the view of a flowing river due to the continuous downpour.

Residents were evacuated to safer places by boats by Al Khidmat Foundation. The administration said arrangements are being made for the drainage of rainwater from the city.

The badly hit areas include Sokarr, Mangrotha, Chitarwata, Wahowah and Littra due to overflowing mountain drains in tehsil Taunsa.

A resident of Tuman Buzdar, Allah Bakhsh Buzdar, told Dawn such fierce flooding had struck the area back in the 1950s when Drug Lahar (mountain drain) in Fazlah valley sank the top of a berry tree grown on agricultural land in front of his ancestral house.

The floodwater’s destination is the Indus River. He said that thanks to social media, warning alerts reached every resident and no human loss was reported in Fazlah but it damaged kachies (agricultural land produced due to intruding rocks in the bed of hill torrent).

The kachies along the route of Drug Lahar, Nilee, Kutba, Phugla, Chanalah, Lelli, Makha, Rason, Fazlah, Kore and Ganjyaali have lost their major chunks to floodwater. Two cows and 20 goats have been swept away in the flooding from Chanalah and Makha.

The bed of Drug Lahar is littered with the carcasses of cows, which came from the Drug area of Balochistan.

The strong current of the flood washed off embankments making kachies more vulnerable. Residents demand the construction of flood channels and check dams and other engineering structures for managing water. An alarming flood in the Vadoor hill torrent has emerged. Up to 145,000 cusec floodwater is flowing towards Dera Ghazi Khan city areas, Loharwala, Samandry, Thatha other human settlements.

Deputy Commissioner Anwar Baryar told Dawn he was supervising the evacuation of people and their livestock from the suburban areas of Dera Ghazi Khan city.

He said that following the continuous rains in Sulaiman Range, the flood in the Vadoor mountain drain is very alarming while the flood level is increasing in the Wahowa hill torrent having a flow of 102,000 cusecs.

On the orders of the commissioner, the breach on 219 Kadira Canal was plugged. The rain has been forecast till Friday.

Published in Dawn, August 18th, 2022