LARKANA: People have begun leaving Warah and Shahdadkot towns as water from breaches in Saifullah Magsi branch and Ghar drain is reportedly moving towards the towns and may inundated them.

Sources in Shahdadkot told Dawn on Sunday that a 150-foot wide breach in Saifullah Magsi branch and mounting water pressure from Balochistan in RBOD had inundated Kutchi Pul town and was now rushing towards south. The main irrigation artery had also developed breaches at other points and the water was overtopping Motorway, said sources.

The sources said that rain and floodwater had entered Ward-5 from Selra locality to Leghari and Mastoi localities in UC-3 of Shahdadkot town.

Local journalists said the continuously mounting water pressure had caused panic among people and they had started leaving the town for safer places.

Another water deluge is coming from the north of Garhi Khairo and currently it was overtopping the Motorway owing to increased pressure. The water was rushing toward UC Karira of Mirokhan, said the sources.

The floodwater also surrounded Qubo Saeed Khan town. It was cumulative pressure of breaches from east-north side and breaches in Saifullah Magsi branch coupled with deluge from RBOD from Balochistan side that was forcing people to flee, said local journalists.

Water had entered certain parts of Warah town after breach in Ghar drain which had forced the population to migrate.

Mor Chandio, a resident of the town, confirmed that water from saline water drains, rain and hill torrents had increased pressure in the Ghar drain, which resulted into the breach.

However, a cut was made in the drain’s dyke at Garhi village to decrease the pressure in Dhamraha Wah near Nasirabad, allowing water to flow to its natural course. Now it was moving towards Mehar, said sources in Nasirabad.

PPP MPA Sardar Khan Chandio and secretary of irrigation visited Zero Point of Flood Protective Bund in Qambar-Shahdadkot to assess water situation at the spot.

ZAB Junior visits marooned farmers

Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Junior was seen wading through knee deep water in a video clip to reach farmers living on his estate in Izat Ji Wandh village and extend them monetary help.

The videos circulating on social networking apps showed him wading through rainwater and visiting inundated mud-thatched houses of his farmers. The villagers raised slogans on finding him among them. Some unconfirmed reports said that he had also extended monetary help to the rain-hit people.

Khuhro inspects dyke

Senator Nisar Ahmed Khuhro, president of PPP Sindh, along with local party leaders visited Akil-Aghani dyke on Sunday. “We had stepped up vigilance along dykes, canals and irrigation arteries in the wake of rise in Indus River,” he said.

He said the irrigation officials had told him that 600,000 cusecs water was passing through Sukkur Barrage which had a capacity of safely passing over 1 million cusecs. Hence, there was no danger, still vigilance along all dykes had been stepped up to cope with any situation, he said. The irrigation officials had been alerted and “we are personally supervising the situation,” he said.

He recalled the effort the government had put in during 2010 and 2011 super floods and handled the difficult time safely. He visited rain-hit people in a relief camp set up in Government Begum Nusrat Bhutto Girls College and assured them of providing all possible help.

Published in Dawn, August 29th, 2022