Floods have flooded the scene around the world. Places that were apparently safe for as long as memory serves are suddenly in the path of torrents of water that have the strength of Hercules and the temper of Goliath. Take the example of July of this year and the destructive and deadly flooding that took place in the Hill Country region of the US state of Texas.
During the flooding, water levels in the local Guadalupe River rose rapidly. As a result, at least 135 people were killed, while at least 117 died in a nearby County.
The footprints of floods whether in the far off US or closer to home are unusually strong and destructive year after year with many lives being lost and whole areas uprooted and destroyed. To those of us who have never encountered such a phenomenon this is really awesome and overpowering.
Generally, these unusually strong floods born out of cloud bursts and other such phenomena are attributed to climate change but then there are floods by consent as is the case in the Indo-Pak subcontinent.
In Pakistan floods are a different ball game altogether where we wait patiently while our neighbour decides when and of what magnitude flood will we encounter and will it be just one flood or a series of floods with pauses that are inspired by our neighbour’s desire to inundate our crops and cattle.
This is as surprising as it sounds the outcome of treaties where both parties have agreed that floods will be directed to our land as and when our neighbour desires and the only precaution he has to take is to warn us within a suitable time frame (usually ignored) and then let the water take its course. I am surprised that there are no specific rules for the disbursement of such huge amounts of water.
It might have been prudent to include some clauses about the amount of water to be let loose on our lands within identified time frames so we could be well prepared and not faced with the herculean task of looking after hundreds of thousands of displaced persons accompanied by nearly an equivalent amount of cattle.
Traditional flooding globally has a long history and Pakistan manages to be among the worst floods in the history of such catastrophes. Let us start with the 1931 China floods, which are considered the deadliest disaster in the world, then there is the 1975 Banqiao Dam failure in China, there is also the 1900 Galveston Hurricane in the United States, Hurricane Katrina in 2005, followed by the devastating 2010 Pakistani floods.
Let us not also forget the unforgettable Bhola Cyclone of 1970 in what was then East Pakistan and in which 300,000–500,000 people perished and which was instrumental in creating discord between the two wings of the country.
Also to be remembered are the St. Felix floods in the Netherlands, which claimed the lives of a hundred thousand people. History is filled with the stories of floods and cyclones that devastated well-settled communities that were left stranded with no roof over their head and most of their worldly possessions blown away.
Floods in Pakistan have different dimensions than floods in other parts of the world. In some provinces in Pakistan, for example, they not only uproot poor people, farmers and others but they also serve to flush out dacoits, a feat which the local authorities fail to accomplish in spite of their well-armed law enforcement forces.
Already, during the recent floods, there are stories of dacoits coming out from what is notoriously known as “Katchay ka ilaqa” to surrender because their hideouts are being washed away and they have no choice.
Floods, it seems, have different dimensions in different parts of the world and indeed in different parts of a country. The western world well organized and well prepared still sometimes gets caught off guard and the results are tragic.
In the less developed world those caught in floods no matter what their origins are used to spend many sleepless nights under open skies and to the buzzing of mosquitos and other insects. As climate change continues to intensify so will floods and the misery of those caught in their fury is only expected to intensify not reduce in the coming years and months.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2025
The writer is a well-known columnist