Floods and Rehabilitation Process - Mark- och vattenteknik

Ulla 

Mörtberg 

Floods and Rehabilitation Process: A 

Study on Problems, Perspectives and 

Socio-Economic Impacts on Sindh 

Province, Pakistan 

Muhammad Amjad Afridi & Muhammad Alam Siddiqui 

February 2013 

TRITA-LWR Degree Project 13-05 

ISSN 1651-064X 

LWR-EX-13-05

Muhammad Amjad Afridi & Muhammad Alam Siddiqui TRITA LWR Degree Project 13:05 

© Muhammad Amjad Afridi & Muhammad Alam Siddiqui 2013 

Degree Project for the masters program in Water Systems Technology 

Department of Land and Water Resources Engineering 

Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) 

SE-100 44 STOCKHOLM, Sweden 

Reference should be written as: Afridi, M.A., Siddiqui, M.A (2013) “Floods and 

Rehabilitation: A Study of Problems, Perspectives and Socio-Economic Impacts on 

Sindh Province, Pakistan” TRITA-LWR Degree Project 13:05, 37p 

ii

Floods and Rehabilitation: Problems, Perspectives and Socio-Economic Impacts on Sindh, Pakistan 

SUMMARY 

Flooding is one of the most common natural disasters not only for Pakistan but to the 

whole world. The reasons behind flooding could be due to occurrence of abnormal 

rainfall, melting of snow or failure of hydraulic structures. Its extent of damage does 

not stick only to losses of lives but in fact infrastructure, cultivated land, water bodies 

and livestock are the sectors which become useless for the whole society. Flooding as 

it disrupts the whole society needs rehabilitation as well after the flood event, which is 

the most challenging one for developing country. The study is focused to review the 

flooding history of Pakistan, conduct field survey in flood relief camps in three 

districts of Sindh Province to raise the problems of rehabilitation process, highlight 

the drawbacks in the flood mitigation measure of the water managers of Pakistan. 

Pakistan has faced more than 24 times flooding since its independence. The flooding 

in 2010 was the most drastic in the history of Pakistan. These flooding resulted in 

29547 USD million estimated financial loss and 12452 human’s loss. Apart of this, the 

floods affected an area of 59576 sq. miles. Southern province of Pakistan, Sindh, is 

most prone province to flooding as the Indus River is passing through the middle of 

the Province. The main causes of flooding in Pakistan are the monsoon rainfall, which 

result flash flooding in the northern part of Pakistan and riverine flooding in the 

southern part i.e. mainly Sindh Province. The southern part is lower than the river bed 

which make the situation critical in the Sindh Province in case of any flooding. The 

damage is also increases as people have encroached to the flood plain in the Sindh 

Province. For flood mitigation, Pakistan have spent billions of USD but such 

investment is mainly in the construction of hydraulic structures and little improvement 

in the flood forecasting after 1992 flooding but have missed to educate people about 

flooding, creating of authentic flood hazard maps, study of Indus River morphology 

and enhancing the capacity of the disaster management agencies. The survey findings 

reveal the mismanagement in the distribution of early compensation money to the 

flood victims, such money has been distributing through a relief card which called 

Watan card. Though 1.6 million of Watan cards have been distributed but still people 

are waiting for such compensation. People those who got this card think that PKR 

100000 or USD 1100 is not enough. Flood victims have serious reservation on 

political leaders being involved in the corruption of cards distribution. Flood victims 

are still in need of relief goods. Flood victims have also pointed out that some feudals 

or political leaders have deliberately diverted the flood water, towards villages, for 

their vested interest. The survey also raised the poor communication between the 

disaster management agencies and people as some people were unaware of flooding 

even till the last stage. NGOs and aid agencies need security and logistic support so 

that they could carry out the relief works in better way to speed up the rehabilitation 

process. The government is supposed to take immediate action in improvement in the 

flood forecasting technology, enhance the flood benefits, educate people about flood 

hazard, execute study of river morphology and make authentic flood hazard maps. All 

such actions must be economical, feasible and meet the Indus basin management plan. 

For relief and rehabilitation process, the government needs to keep the political 

leaders away from any kind of involvement in the whole process to make the relief 

and rehabilitation process smooth and free from any sort of corruption. 

iii


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SUMMARY IN SWEDISH 

Översvämningar är en av de vanligaste naturkatastroferna inte bara för Pakistan utan 

för hela världen. Orsakerna översvämning kan bero på är förekomst av onormala regn 

nivåer, smältande snö eller fel av hydrauliska strukturer. Skadans omfattning 

inbegriper inte bara förluster liv utan infrastruktur, odlad mark, vattendrag, 

djurenheter är de sektorer som blir värdelösa för samhället. Översvämningar som stör 

hela rehabiliteringen samhället behöver efter översvämning, som är den mest 

utmanande för utvecklingsländer. Studien är fokuserad att granska översvämningarnas 

historia, Pakistan uppförde fältundersöknings läger om översvämningar i tre distrikt i 

Sindh-provinsen för att påvisa problemen med rehabilitering, markera nackdelarna i 

att begränsa översvämningarnas mått i Pakistan. Pakistan har haft mer än 24 

översvämningar sedan dess självständighet. Översvämningarna under 2010 var den 

mest drastiska i historien om Pakistan. Dessa översvämningar resulterade i 29.547 M 

USD beräknad ekonomisk förlust och 12.452 populations förlust. Bortsett från detta, 

påverkade översvämningarna ett område av 59.576 kvm miles. Södra provinsen av 

Pakistan, Sindh, är den mest benägna provins till översvämningar då floden Indus 

passerar genom mitten av provinsen. De främsta orsakerna till översvämningar i 

Pakistan är monsun regn, vilket resulterat i plötsliga översvämningar i norra delen av 

Pakistan och flodens översvämningar i södra delen, dvs huvudsakligen Sindhprovinsen. 

Den södra delen är lägre än flodbädden som gör situationen kritisk i Sindhprovinsen 

i händelse av översvämning. Skadan ökar också eftersom människor har 

inkräktat på flodslätten i Sindh-provinsen. För att begränsa översvämningar har 

Pakistan spenderat miljarder dollar, men en sådan investering är främst i byggandet av 

hydrauliska strukturer och liten förbättring i översvämningsprognoser efter 1992 års 

översvämningar, men man har missat att utbilda människor om översvämningar, 

skapa autentiska kartor över översvämningshotade områden, studie av Indus flodens 

morfologi och öka kapaciteten av katastrofhantering. Undersökningens resultat visar 

en misskötsel i fördelningen av tidig kompensation till offren för översvämningarna, 

dessa pengar har distribueras genom en lättnads kort som kallas Watan kort. Även 1,6 

miljoner av Watan kort har delats ut, men fortfarande finns människor som väntar på 

sådan ersättning. Människor som fick detta kort tror att PKR 100.000 eller 1100 dollar 

är inte tillräckligt. Översvämningsoffer har allvarliga reservationer på politiska ledare 

som är involverade i korruption av kortets distribution. Översvämningsdrabbade är 

fortfarande i behov av lättnads varor. Översvämningsoffer har också påpekat att vissa 

läns eller politiska ledare avsiktligt har avlett flodens vatten, mot byar, för deras 

egenintresse. Undersökningen tog också den dåliga kommunikationen mellan 

myndigheternas katastrofhantering och människor, då vissa människor var omedvetna 

om översvämningar ända till det sista steget. Frivilligorganisationer och biståndsorgan 

behöver trygghet och logistiskt stöd så att de kunde genomföra lättnad på ett bättre 

sätt och påskynda rehabiliteringsprocessen. Regeringen ska vidta omedelbara åtgärder 

gällande förbättring tekniken runt översvämningsprognoser, öka översvämningens 

fördelar, utbilda människor om översvämningshoten, köra studie av flodens morfologi 

och göra autentiska kartor över översvämningshotade områden. Alla sådana åtgärder 

måste vara ekonomiska, genomförbara och träffa Indus förvaltningsplan. För lindring 

och rehabilitering, måste regeringen hålla de politiska ledarna från alla former av 

inblandning i hela processen för att göra lättnad och rehabilitering jämn och fri från 

någon form av korruption. 

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 

First of all, we are thankful to all teachers, teacher’s assistants and friends for their 

support in any respect at different stages of this master program in Water Systems 

Technology at The Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Sweden. 

We would like to express our deepest gratitude to the degree project advisor, Prof. 

Prosun Bhattacharya, whose availability, fruitful discussions, insightful advices and 

guidance enabled us to complete this degree project. 

We offer great regards to all those who helped us in the field visits to the flood relief 

camps in the study area, Sindh Province, Pakistan. The survey would not have been 

executed without their support. 

Finally, we would like to thank our families for their infinite love, encouragement and 

support in every form for so long. Without their kindness and prayers, the master 

program studies would not have been possible. 

Muhammad Amjad Afridi 

Muhammad Alam Siddiqui 

Stockholm, February, 2013 

vii


viii


TABLE OF CONTENTS 

Summary 

iii 

Summary in Swedish 

v 

Acknowledgements 

vii 

Table of Contents 

ix 

Abbreviations 

xi 

Abstract 1 

Introduction 1 

Aim of the Study 2 

Material 2 

Location and area of study 2 

Sindh Province 2 

Literature Review of Flooding in Pakistan 4 

History of Pakistan Flood 6 

Indus Basin Water System 7 

Irrigation System 10 

Causes of Flood 10 

Flood Mitigation Measures 15 

PMD, Flood Forecasting and Warning Systems 17 

Flood Damages in Sindh 18 

Impacts on Housing 18 

Impacts on Basic public services and Infrastructure 18 

Impacts on Agriculture and Livestock 18 

Impacts on Socio-Economic and Health Units 18 

Impacts on Indus River Morphology 19 

Relief and Rehabilitation Process 20 

National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) 20 

Provincial Disaster Management Authorities (PDMA) 21 

Emergency Relief Cell (ERC) 21 

Pak Army Relief Wing 21 

Watan Card Scheme 21 

Methods 22 

Results and Discussions 25 

Analysis of the responses of flood affected people in the field survey 25 

Analysis of the responses of NGOs and aid agencies 30 

Analysis of the responses of Policy makers 31 

Analysis of flood mitigation measures 31 

Conclusion and Recommendations 33 

Conclusion 33 

Recommendations 34 

Technical and Management Issues 34 

Awareness Programs 34 

Relief and Rehabilitations 35 

References 36 

Other references 36 

Appendices 

I 

A. Flood affected people in study area of Sindh province, assessment of basic 

demographic information 

I 

B. Questionnaire response from the flood victims II 

C. Questionnaire response from the aid agencies personals III 

D. Questionnaire response from the NGOs III 

E. Questionnaire response from Policy makers IV 

ix


x


ABBREVIATIONS 

ADB 

DDMA 

ERC 

FEWS 

FFC 

FFD 

FPSP 

ICID 

IFFS 

NDMA 

NFPP 

NGOs 

PDMA 

PKR 

PMD 

RMP 

SEK 

UNO 

USD 

WAPDA 

WFD 

WMO 

Pakistan and Asian Development Bank 

District Disaster Management Authority 

Emergency Relief Cell 

Flood Early Warning System 

Federal Flood Commission 

Flood Forecasting Division 

First Flood Protection Sector Project 

International Commission on Irrigation and Drainage 

Indus Flood Forecasting System 

National disaster Management Authority 

National Flood Protection Plan 

Non-Governmental Organizations 

Provincial Disaster Management Authority 

Pakistani Rupees 

Pakistan Meteorological Department 

River Management Program 

Swedish Krona 

United Nation Organization 

United States Dollar 

Water and Power Development Authority 

World Food Programme 

World Meteorological Organization 

xi


xii


ABSTRACT 

Flooding is a common natural disaster to Pakistan and to its Sindh Province. Flooding 

brings a challenging task for the disaster management agencies to bring back the 

whole infrastructure to pre-flood situation through proper rehabilitation process. The 

study is focused to review the flooding history of Pakistan, conduct survey in flood 

relief camps of Sindh Province to raise the problems of rehabilitation process, 

highlight the drawbacks in the flood mitigation measures of Pakistan. The 2010 flood 

was the most devastating in the history of Pakistan, which resulted in an estimated 

financial loss of more than USD 10000 million. The principal causes of floods in 

Pakistan are the monsoon heavy rainfall and the topography of the Indus River, which 

produce flash flooding in the northern and riverine flooding in the south-eastern part 

of Pakistan i.e.Sindh Province. PMD is lacking of modern technology to forecast the 

flash flooding and there is a lack of coordination between disaster management 

agencies. The field survey raises the mismanagement in the distribution of the relief 

goods, slow process of rehabilitations and low confidence of the flood victims on the 

political leaders. Similarly, NGOs and aid agencies need security and logistic support 

to help the government in a much better way to speed up the rehabilitation process. 

Pakistani water policy makers have to educate the people as well about flooding to 

reduce the flood damages. Flood impact in Pakistan can also be reduced by paying 

attention to study of river morphology, construction of water reservoirs and 

improvement of disaster management capacity, but all such measures must be 

integrated to the current Indus basin management plan. 

Key words: Flooding, Indus River, Rehabilitation, Watan card, Pakistan 

INTRODUCTION 

Flooding is a natural disaster which causes the loss of lives of people and 

property in the flooded area. Though flooding is universally known as 

natural disaster but meeting to such event is still unfolded. No doubt 

such natural events cannot be stopped even after all preparations but it 

does not mean to let such events to befall and to disrupt the whole 

society. Though technologically such challenge could be partially mitigate 

it, by floodplain management, integrated flood management, developing 

of an excellent flood warning system, etc, but even by developing of 

such advanced and integrated systems to safeguard the lives and capital, 

the risk and vulnerability of flooding is still alive even for the developed 

countries. The main difficulty in dealing with flooding, as compared to 

other natural disasters, is its chain effect, as it hits the houses, public 

buildings, infrastructure services, livestock hydraulic structures and 

definitely the socio-economy of the area. However, quantifying of these 

damages could be easily done but the real challenge is to carry out the 

relief and rehabilitation process right after the flooding. 

Relief and rehabilitation process is not just a one day job but in fact a 

complex transitional process, which requires an efficient flood crisis 

management approach. The process becomes more complex when the 

affected territory is lacking of resources to bring back the whole society 

to their pre-flooding situation. 

South Asian countries have been facing high frequency and magnitude of 

flooding for the last 3 to 4 decades even after investing millions of 

dollars to reduce the risk of flooding by the resourceful countries 

(Ahmad et al., 2011). Among the South Asian countries, Pakistan and 

Bangladesh are the most prone countries to flooding due to lack of 

resources, inefficient flood control system and water management 

1


MATERIAL 

approach and definitely the monsoon season. It is observed that the uneven 

rainfall, generally trigger the flooding in the monsoon season. 

Sindh, which is located in south-eastern part of Pakistan, economically 

depended on its agriculture sector. Water is the main source of income 

of the people in Sindh Province. The Province is at the risk of flooding 

as the main source of water of the country, Indus River, passes in the 

middle of the Province. Sindh generally faces riverine flooding in the 

monsoon season and every flood hit the province severely due to its 

dependency on agricultural sector. People of the rural area are most 

vulnerable to flood as they encroached to the floodplain area. Due to 

this, relief and rehabilitation process has been a big issue for the local 

flood management authorities after every flood event. 

The recurrence of flood with high frequency and magnitude even after 

enough preparations then the question pop-up in minds that whether the 

flooding in Pakistan occurs due to climate change ? Or is it a man-made 

disaster due to lack of proper water management or deliberately breaches 

of leaves for vested interest. This is a debatable issue which will be tried 

to address in this study as well, to some extent. 

Aim of the Study 

The aim of the study is to analyze the scenario of the devastating flood 

and its rehabilitation process in the province of Sindh in southern part of 

Pakistan. The specific objectives of the study included: 

Review of the major events of flooding in Pakistan since its 

independence till 2011. 

Study the relief and rehabilitation process in the camps of the flood 

victims in the worst affected districts of Kotri, Thatta and Larkana in 

Sindh Province through field based questionnaire survey. 

Highlight the drawbacks in the flood mitigation measures, relief to 

flood victims and the rehabilitation process and provide 

recommendations to improve the flood management process. 

Location and area of study 

Pakistan is located in the middle of the South Asian region and 

surrounded by neighboring countries of Afghanistan, China, India and 

Iran with a coast of Arabian Sea (Fig.1). It is located in the temperate lies 

wholly in the temperate zone between latitudes 24ᵒ and 37ᵒ North and 

longitudes 61ᵒ and 75ᵒ East. It composed of four provinces i.e. 

Balochistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Punjab and Sindh. It covers 796,095 

sq.km areas with estimated population of 180 millions. The water 

availability is around 2.7% of the country’s area (Pakistan’s Ministry of 

information and broadcasting, 2011). Physiographically Pakistan can be 

divided into three regions (Fig. 2) (ICID, 2011). 

Alluvial plain of the Indus River and its tributaries (i.e. 319,605 sq.km) 

Plateau of Balochistan (i.e. 242,683 sq.km) 

North and north-west mountainous (i.e. 241,647 sq.km) 

Sindh Province 

Sindh Province (Fig. 3), named after the River Sindh (Indus), is the 

south-eastern part of Pakistan (located between Lat 23ᵒ-35ᵒ and Lat 28ᵒ- 

30ᵒ N). It covers 140,914 Sq. km i.e.18% of the total area of Pakistan. 

Estimated population of the province is 35 millions. The boundaries of 

2


Figure 1: Map of Pakistan showing different provinces and 

territories 

Sindh is meeting with Punjab Province in the north; Baluchistan Province 

in the west, India is in the east and Arabian Sea in the south of Sindh. 

About 60% percent of the area of Sindh is cultivating i.e. 8 million 

hectares out total geographical area i.e. 14 million hectares. Climatically 

around 60% of the area is arid. Annual average precipitation of the 

province is13 mm. Indus River along with 4 other tributaries flow in the 

middle of the province. It is mainly uses for agriculture and fishing 

purpose by the local people. Though Indus River brings amenity to the 

province but it is also result in the devastating flood in the monsoon 

season due to excessive rainfall. The Indus River discharges to Arabian 

Sea after passing through the Kotri district (FFC, 2010). 

According to 1998 national census, Sindh is administratively composed 

of 66923 human settlements which are divided in 23 districts, 119 

Tehsils, 1100 Union Councils. The livelihood of the people of Sindh is 

based on agricultural and pastoral activities. Karachi, which is a mega 

city, is the capital of Sindh and exhibit two sea ports, namely, Bin Qasim 

and Karachi port which meet all the standards which a high level port 

does. These ports are useful not even for the whole country but also for 

landlocked country Afghanistan (PDMA Sindh, 2011). 

The economy of Sindh Province is predominantly agricultural and 

depends entirely on irrigation. Indus River water is mainly uses for 

irrigation purpose in the whole province, while the municipality of the 

Karachi gets the drinking water from Indus River after certain treatment. 

3


Figure 2: Physiographic map of Pakistan (Hussain and Lee, 2009) 

There are three barrages on the Indus River in Sindh Province i.e. 

Guddu, Lloyd and Kotri. Guddo is constructed nearby the Punjab 

border, Lloyd is located in Sukkur and Kotri barrage is located in Kotri 

district near to Arabian Sea (PDMA Sindh, 2011). 

Sindh plays an important role in the country’s agriculture Gross 

Domestic Product (GDP) as the agricultural productions reach to 25 

percent of the total GDP (Sindh Agriculture Department, 2005). Major 

crop productions include wheat, rice, cotton, oilseeds, sugarcane, 

vegetables. The province is divided into urban and rural areas. Apart 

from agriculture sector, people of rural area use fishing, animals (e.g. 

cattle, Sheep, camels etc) and poultry as a source of income. While 

Urban Sindh areas, namely, Karachi, Hyderabad, Nooriabad, Kotri and 

Sukkur are the base of manufacturing industries which also include the 

only State’s run steel mill, located in Karachi. These industries produce 

textiles, electronic, chemicals, automobile, railway tracks, steel and other 

metal products (PDMA Sindh, 2011). 

Literature Review of Flooding in Pakistan 

Pakistan has been severely affected by both flash and fluvial/riverine 

flooding. The damages of flood vary with respect to the type of flood, 

however it also depend on the flood management approach, topography 

and climate of the area. It is worth to understand the difference between 

the flash and riverine flooding before to review the flooding history of 

Pakistan and its related mitigation measures. 

4


Figure 3: Map of Study area i.e. Sindh province (PDMA Sindh, 

2011) 

Flash flood generally occurs nearby the mountainous areas, where slope of 

the terrain play major role in converting the intense rainfall to flood. As 

the rainfall water flow downstream from the slopes, the flowing water 

gets the acceleration and in a very short time it raises the flow level in the 

river. As the water level raises very quickly in river, the flood forecasting 

and warning authority does not get enough time to respond in the same 

manner to evacuate the nearby area of the river before the river water 

spills outside (US NOAA, 1992; UNHABITAT, 2010). Following are the 

type of damages that could Flash flood triggers (UNHABITAT, 2010). 

Foundation’s undermining of both hydraulic and non-hydraulic 

structures. 

Erosion at the base walls and corners of the structures. 

Wiping out of infrastructures. 

Flow of debris along its way resulting in deposition of debris in house 

and damages to infrastructures. 

Riverine flood is generally caused by heavy rainfall or splitting of glaciers 

resulting in high level of flow in the river or stream (UNHABITAT, 

2010). The river gets the water from the large area, due to this the speed 

of the flowing water is comparatively slow and it takes much time to 

reach river. The water level in the river rises slowly; as a result the 

authorities have generally enough time to respond and to issue the flood 

warning before the water flow level reach to the food level. When the 

5


water level exceeds the flood level, it burst the river banks and inundates 

the floodplain. In case of any deep water ponding due to riverine 

flooding, it becomes difficult to the authorities to drain out the water 

from the flooded area due to poor drainage system. Riverine flooding 

could severely damage the whole infrastructure (e.g. telecommunications 

network, sewerage systems, road network etc) and could disintegrate the 

flooded area from the rest of the country. 

History of Pakistan Flood 

Since independence, i.e. 14 th August 1947, Pakistan has been vulnerable 

to flooding which could either be due to lack of water management or 

lack of resources to construct efficient drainage system. The alarming 

point is that, the recurrence of flooding is very regular as Pakistan has 

faced flood events more than 20 times. The country hit by the first 

flooding in 1950 and the country is still prone to severe flooding. The 

magnitude and intensity of the flood has been varied and resulted in 

losses of many people, socio- economic problems (Table 1 and Fig. 4 to 

7), water borne diseases and affected the irrigations system of the 

country, which is in fact one of the world largest irrigation system. The 

economic losses have been more than 12 USD billion (FFC, 2010). It is 

worth to discuss the flood management system of the country before 

finding out the possible causes of the flood in Pakistan. 

Table 1: Historical Flood Damages in Pakistan (FFC, 2010; PDMA 

Sindh*, 2011; UN**, 2011) 

Flood 

Year 

Flooded 

Area 

(Sq mile) 

Human 

Losses 

(No) 

Villages 

Affected 

(No) 

1950 3861 2190 10000 488 

1955 2681 679 6945 378 

1956 4482 160 11609 318 

1957 1737 83 4498 301 

1959 1507 88 3902 234 

1973 3752 474 9719 5134 

1975 3331 126 8628 684 

1976 31630 425 18390 3485 

1977 847 848 2185 338 

1978 3552 393 9199 2237 

1981 800 82 2071 298 

1983 248 39 643 135 

1984 97 42 251 75 

1988 37 508 100 857 

1992 5066 1008 13208 3010 

1994 626 431 1622 843 

1995 2646 591 6852 376 

Estimated 

Economic Losses 

(USD Millions) 

2003 Not known 484 4376 Not known 





2010 61777 1985 17553 10000 

2011 10429* 497* 38347* 356** 

Total 59576 12452 181804 29547 

6


Figure 4: Ariel extent of flooding at national level (FFC, 2010; 

PDMA Sindh, 2011) 

Figure 5: Historical Human losses due to flooding at national level 

(FFC, 2010; PDMA Sindh, 2011) 

Figure 6: Historical Villages losses due to flooding at national level 

(FFC, 2010; PDMA Sindh, 2011) 

Indus Basin Water System 

Indus Basin has an estimated area of one million sq km which is 

considered one of the largest river basins in Asia. Geographically, it 

crosses the boundaries of four South Asian countries, namely, 

Afghanistan, China, India and Pakistan. The majority of basin plain 

extends to Provinces Punjab, Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in 

Pakistan with 56% of the total basin area and covers about 70% area of 

the country. According to estimates of 1991, the basin has a population 

7


of 196 million (Fahlbusch et al., 2004; Rehman and Kamal, 2010). Indus 

basin consists of five rivers, namely, Indus, Chenab, Jhelum, Sutlej and 

Ravi (Fig. 8 and 9). These rivers are considered as the main tributaries of 

the Indus basin (Rehman and Kamal, 2010). However there are number 

of minor tributary rivers and streams as well (FFC, 2010; Ahmad et al., 

2011). 

Figure 7: Estimated economic losses due to flooding at national 

level (FFC, 2010 and UN, 2011) 

Table 2: Salient features of rivers in flowing in Pakistan (NDMA- 

UNDP, 2010; Tariq and Van de Giesen, 2011) 

Name of Rivier Sutlej Ravi Chenab Jhelum Indus 

Origin 

Discharge to 

Length(km) 

Basin area(km 2 ) 

Average annual flow 

(km 3 /yr) 

No dams in India 

No of dams in 

Pakistan 

No. of barrages in 

India 

No of barrages in 

Pakistan 

China India India India China 

Chenab Chenab Indus Chenab Arabian Sea 

1500 900 1240 820 3200 

122,000 40,000 67,500 63,500 727,000 

3.05 4.46 25.17 24.33 83.15 

4 1 2 – – 

– – – 1 1 

3 2 5 1 6 

2 2 5 1 5 

8


Figure 8: Flood routing model in Indus Basin (PMD, 2011) 

The Indus basin starts form the Hindukush-Himalyan region gets the 

water from the melting of the snow and from monsoon precipitations. 

The basin furnish water to four countries, but Pakistan has been the 

most vulnerable to flooding throughout its history of flooding even 

though all the major tributaries of the basin are either start or pass from 

the territory of India (Rehman and Kamal, 2010). 

Due to this unique geographical location of the Indus basin Pakistan and 

India has signed a Treaty in 1960 with the help of World Bank to share 

the water of the Indus basin (Table 2). As per the geographical location, 

India is on the upstream while Pakistan is on the downstream side. 

The mean annual inflow to Pakistan through rivers is 181.37 km 3 . The 

major inflow is through western rivers (Indus, Jhelum, Chenab and 

including Kabul river) which is 170.27 km 3 while from the eastern rivers 

(Ravi and Sutlej) is only 11.1 km 3 . The eastern rivers including River 

Beas are in the full control of India under Indus Treaty 1960. Pakistan is 

getting 85% of the water inflow from the Himalayan region in summer 

and around 15% in winter season (Panikkar, 2008). The treaty is still 

withstanding even the two parties of the treaty, Pakistan and India, has 

had disputes over the distribution of water even after signing the treaty. 

9


Pakistan has raised many times reservation over the construction of 

dams or barrages by India, whenever the hydraulic structures were not 

fulfilling the conditions of the treaty. World Bank generally resolves the 

water issues between these two countries as per the Indus water treaty. 

Irrigation System 

Pakistan has one of the largest integrated irrigation systems in the world 

which covers the whole country. In 1995, the total area of the Indus 

irrigation system was estimated about 13,972,500 hectares(Panikkar, 

2008). It consists of small and large storages reservoirs, barrages, link and 

main irrigation canals (Table 3). 

Causes of Flood 

Flood in Pakistan has generally been caused by the heavy concentrated 

raining in the monsoon season, which contributes to high flow level in 

the Jhelum and Chenab Rivers. Unfortunately, India has an edge on the 

water distribution in the Indus basin as Pakistan does not have any 

control on the River Chenab, Sutlej and Ravi due to Indus water Treaty. 

However, construction of new reservoirs or improvement of existing 

hydraulic structures is inevitable, so that to meet the high flood level 

situation. In 2010, monsoon resulted persistent rainfall even in those 

country’s regions which were not even vulnerable to heavy rainfall. 

Figure 9: Flowing path of the Indus River throughout Pakistan 

(Gaurav et al., 2011) 

Table 3: Hydraulic infrastructure on the Indus irrigation system 

(FFC, 2010; Ahmad et al., 2011; ICID, 2011) 

Hydraulic Structures 

Main Storage reservoirs ( approximately 12 MAF) 3 

Barrages 19 

Link Canals( Inter-River) 12 

Main irrigation Canals (Independent) 45 

No 

Dams with height 15 m or above (approximately 3 MAF) 143 

10


Monsoon is the shift in wind direction and is considered the main driver 

of heavy raining throughout the world. In monsoon season wind blows 

from ocean to land however in non-monsoon season it becomes in 

opposite direction. When this non-monsoon seasonal wind shift from 

ocean to land then it become moist and is called the monsoon wind. 

This moist air results in excessive rainfall in Pakistan, North and South 

America and Africa. In Pakistan, monsoon season starts from June and 

remain active till September. The monsoon winds generate from the Bay 

of Bengal and enter the Sindh Province from Indian boarder (Impact 

Forecasting, 2010). 

The monsoon season from July 2010 to August 2010 was unprecedented 

due to its intensity and time duration. In meteorological terminology, a 

ridge of high pressure was developed in the beginning of July 2010, near 

the Ural Mountains (Russia), which became stationary for two months. 

With passage of time, this stationary high pressure established a blocking 

pattern called Omega block (Fig. 10). Due to such persistent blockage, 

severe weather pattern were developed in the 2010 as it resulted in the 

extreme heat and wildfire in Russia, devastating flooding in China and in 

Pakistan (Impact forecasting, 2010). Monsoon winds patterns (Fig. 11 to 

15) since 1950 resulted in many floods and the 2010 flood was the 

severe. The rainfall was extremely intensive, which flooded an area of 

6777 sq miles (FFC, 2010). Akhtar (2011), states that the rainfall was the 

most abnormal weather event in the history of Pakistan, which resulted 

in a very high river inflow (Fig. 16). 

Figure 10: Omega block is clearly visible in the “upper level 

atmospheric map” (July – August 2010) over western Russia 

(Impact forecasting, 2010) 

Figure 11: Monsoon Tracks 1950-1976(PMD, 2010) 

11


Figure 12: Monsoon tracks 1978 - 1995(PMD, 2010) 

Figure 13: Monsoon tracks 2003-2007 (PMD, 2010) 

The catchment area and river training facilities installed are the major 

factors which affect the flow pattern of flooding in the rivers. Rivers at 

the low altitude do not face snow melting and monsoon rainfall at the 

same time, however high altitude rivers, Indus and Jhelum, is facing both 

these natural phenomena at the same time which significantly play in 

flooding (Tariq and Van de Giesen, 2011). According to Rehman and 

Kamal (2010), that river Indus River itself does not play any role in 

flooding but its Jhelum and Chenab Rivers which cause flooding. Tariq 

and Van de Giesen (2011) stated that River Chenab has contributed to 

most of the floods in the Pakistan’s history (Fig.17). 

Topography of the Indus River also play a vital role in resulting of flooding 

as Indus River flows both in northern and south-eastern part of the 

country. In the northern part, the surrounding area is at higher altitude 

than the river bed while in the southern side the river bed is at higher 

level. In northern part, when the Indus River overflow to the 

surrounding area, the water flow back to river as soon the water level get 

12


lower in the river. However, this phenomenon does not occur in the 

south-eastern Pakistan as the bed of the Indus River is at higher level 

than the surrounding area. Sindh province, which is located in southeastern 

part of the country, faces severe damages in the flooding due to 

this topographical reason. To overcome this problem, construction of 

flood protection embankments/levees has been made throughout the 

Indus River in this Sindh Province but this mitigation measure is not 

enough to reduce the flood damages. The damages become more drastic 

when the flood water causes breaches in flood protection embankments, 

particularly in areas where people have encroached to the floodplain 

(Ahmad et al., 2011). In Sindh province there are number of districts 

which are vulnerable to different type of flooding in monsoon season 

(Table 4). 

Figure 14: Monsoon track 2009 (PMD, 2010) 

Figure 15: Monsoon tracks 2010 (PMD, 2010) 

13


Hydraulic structures like Tarbela and Mangla are multipurpose dams but 

were purely constructed for the irrigation and power generations. In 

2010 devastating flooding, Tarbela dam did not play any major role in 

reducing the flood level at the downstream. These dams can be very 

useful in flood management if the current operations of these dams have 

to be optimized for flood control at downstream (Tariq and Van de 

Giesen, 2011). Similarly, the hydraulic structure (i.e. barrages and 

bridges) which are constructed on Indus, Ravi and Chenab Rivers, do 

not have the adequate discharge capacity to meet the unexpected high 

level of flow due to either snowmelt or excessive rainfall. 

Encroachment of people, in Sindh Province, to the floodplain is another 

factor which generally results in heavy damages in flood season. The 

people who are living around the floodplain are mainly poor people and 

are moved in search of economic benefits. Their main source of income 

is agriculture and fishing in the riverine area. There is a need of flood 

hazard maps for at least such floodplain so that the people either keep 

away through legal measures or flood awareness programs. The 

government should provide alternative places to re-settle the people 

(Ahmad et al., 2011). 

Figure 16: Historical mean rainfall and river inflow relationship in 

the Indus River (Akhtar, 2011) 

Figure 17: Annual Peak flows (1921-2010) in Indus Basin River 

System (Tariq and Van de Giesen, 2011) 

14


Table 4: Vulnerable districts to flooding during monsoon season 

(PDMA Sindh, 2011) 

District in Sindh Province 

Karachi 

Thatta 

Dadu 

Kambar Shahdadkot 

Larkana 

Khairpur Mirs 

Naushero Feroze 

Shaheed Benazirabad 

Sanghar 

Hyderabad 

Kashmore 

Jacobabad 

Shikarpur 

Matiari 

Jamshoro 

Sukkur 

Ghotki 

Tando Muhammad Khan 

Type of Flooding 

Urban 

Riverine 

Riverine and Flash 



Riverine 

Riverine 

Riverine 

Riverine and precipitation based 

Riverine and urban flooding 

Riverine and urban flooding 

Riverine 

Riverine 

Riverine 

Riverine 

Riverine 

Riverine 

Riverine 

Flood Mitigation Measures 

In historical perspective, Pakistan was not equipped against the flooding 

for 30 years after independence, during this period the country faced 

several severe flooding events, which resulted in huge human and 

economic losses (Tariq and Van de Giesen, 2011)(Table 1). The lack of 

proper flood mitigation measures during this period could be due to 

inadequate resources but definitely being involved in several wars with 

the neighboring country, India. Soon, after the flooding of 1975 and 

1977 the Federal government decided to review the flood protection 

measures. In the first instance a unified approach was realized to be the 

optimal solution for the flood mitigation as it was initially the 

responsibility of the provincial governments to carry out flood protection 

measures. In this regards a new institution was created with the name of 

Federal Flood Commission(FFC) in 1977 and had given the following 

mandate (FFC, 2010; Rehman and Kamal, 2010; Tariq and Van de 

Giesen, 2011). 

Prepare flood protection plans/schemes with the coordination of 

provincial governments. 

Improvement of the flood forecasting and warning system. 

Reviewing and restoration of the flood protection measures. 

Supervise all the flood control and protection arrangements in the 

provincial governments. 

Provide financial and technical support to the provincial governments 

to carry out flood protection works. 

15


With the above mandate a new and integrated National Flood Protection 

Plan (NFPP) was prepared in 1978 for the next 10 years. It is important 

to mention here, that from 1978 to 1988 about US$ 220 million USD 

was invested for flood protection measures excluding relief and 

rehabilitations. Apart of this, Pakistan Meteorological Department (PMD) 

and Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA) which are 

working on the flood control and forecasting had improved their 

telemetry and flood forecasting system (FFC, 2010). 

According to FFC (2010), that in the 2 nd NFPP plan from 1988 to 1998 

about US$ 66 million (01US$ = 86 PKR) was utilized. The output of this 

plan resulted in the FPSP-I (First Flood Protection Sector Project) and 

Emergent Flood Protection Schemes were established. Out of total 85% 

fund was used in FPSP-I to implement 257 schemes in the four 

provinces. From 1994 to 1996 Prime Minister’s River Management 

Program (RMP) was initiated with the cost of US$ 7.136 million (01 US$ 

= 86 PKR) to implement flood management scheme in Sindh and 

Punjab. The funding for this period was from government of Pakistan 

and Asian Development Bank (ADB). The main output of NFPP-II was 

the following (FFC, 2010):- 

Equipment of Flood Forecasting Division (FFD) Lahore by 

installation of 10-CM Quantitative Precipitation Measurement 

Weather Radars. 

Installation of 25 Meteor burst Telecommunication Systems. 

Preparation of floodplain maps of Indus River. 

Pre-feasibilities studies for increasing discharge capacity of four 

barrages as per 1992 flood level. 

The third NFPP was carried out for 1998 to 2008. About US$ 40 million 

(01 US$ = 86 PKR) was invested on 363 flood protection schemes 

throughout the country. For second FPSP, about US$ 48.130 million (01 

US$ = 86 PKR) was invested on 101 schemes, and about US$ 16.279 

million (01 US$ = 86 PKR) was invested in improving the flood 

forecasting and warning system (FFC, 2010). 

The fourth NFPP (2008 to 2018) was prepared to carry out flood works 

with the estimated investment of US$ 35 million (01 US$ = 86 PKR), 

the plan is not yet approved as per FFC 2010 report. In total about PKR 

26138 million is invested in the flood control and protection works and 

forecasting systems (FFC, 2010). The distribution of investment by FFC, 

to execute the flood protection works has been mainly on need-based 

criteria as per NFPP policy (FFC, 2010). In this regards priority was 

given to such measures which were highly beneficial to reduce the socioeconomic 

and human losses. It is important to here that the designing of 

flood protection structures and river training structures were based on 

high standards of quality with life span of 50 years for flood protection 

structures and 100 years for river structures (Tariq and Van de Giesen, 

2011). 

Flood mitigation works has been mainly based on provision of hydraulic 

structures on river courses. In this regards, embankments and spurs has 

been constructed at large, to train the river course for the purpose to 

reduce the river erosions and ultimately reduce the flood damages (Tariq 

and Van de Giesen, 2011). According to FFC (2010), embankments with 

the length of 6803.19 km and 1420 number of spurs have been 

constructed throughout the country as structural measures against the 

floods to minimize the human and economic losses (Table 5). 

16


Table 5: Flood protection measures Province-wise (FFC, 2010) 

Name of Province 

Spurs 

(No.) 

Embankments 

(km) 

Punjab 496 3332.09 

Sindh 46 2422 

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa 186 352.24 

Baluchistan 682 696.85 

Total in Pakistan 1410 6803.18 

PMD, Flood Forecasting and Warning Systems 

Pakistan Meteorological Department (PMD) has been contributing a 

major role in the development of the socio-economic sector of Pakistan. 

It came into existence in 1947 with only 15 meteorological observatories 

and with the aim of providing services for aviation sector (WMO, 2010). 

With the passage of time, PMD has extended its scope of work and 

these days PMD can function in meteorology, hydrology (i.e. flood 

forecasting) and seismology area. PMD has now provincial regional 

meteorological centers and a Flood Forecasting Division (FFD) unit. 

PMD disseminate outward all forecasts to the other governmental 

departments/agencies, which are involved in the management of the 

flood, so that these departments/agencies could carry out necessary 

action as per the weather forecasts (WMO, 2010). 

FFD is one of the most important units of PMD. After certain 

investment, FFD is now capable of providing services throughout the 

country for hydrometeorological and flood forecasting measures. It can 

provide both qualitative and quantitative forecasts (WMO, 2010). 

PMD uses 7 weather radars to observe the intense rainfall throughout 

Pakistan. Most of these radars are installed in early 1990s, though some 

of them are now upgraded. The radars functioning continuously in 

monsoon season only, as PMD head office does not have enough 

resources to operate these radars continuously throughout the year so 

that to collect high resolution pictures. So, PMD head office collect the 

raw data pictures throughout the year, except monsoon season, from the 

respective radars office. PMD has 90 meteorological observational 

stations across the country, but all observational stations are manoperated. 

Apart of this, PMD get rainfall observations of 45 stations 

from the Water and Power Development Authority, these rainfall 

observational stations are primarily for the operations of dam, while 

there are 500 ordinary rainfall measuring gauges with PMD. PMD gets 

the observations of these gauges through other governmental 

departments or agencies on monthly basis (WMO, 2010). 

PMD has done advancement in flood forecasting system and in flood 

routing, as computer models and simulations are in practice for the 

routing of runoff through the Indus River systems. Real time rainfall 

data is acquired, to operate/run such models (WMO, 2010). Since 

2007, FFD has been using flood early warning system (FEWS) model, 

which is a rainfall runoff and routing model. But unfortunately, this 

model has not been updated, which definitely makes the model’s 

meteorological observation doubtful. This model can be only used for 

riverine type of flood. FFD is not equipped with early warning or flood 

forecasting systems for the flash flooding (WMO, 2010). 

17


Flood Damages in Sindh 

The damages of the flooding 2010 were severed throughout the flood 

affected areas but it varied with respect to the topography, population 

density, land use and definitely the type of flood it had been. The 

flooding 2010 was composed of flash and riverine types, depending on 

the area of geography. According to NDMA (2011), the 2010 monsoon 

flooding was due to the un-even pattern of rainfall, resulting the worst 

ever flood in the history of the region and it was called by the then UN 

secretary General as the “Slow Evolving Tsunami” (Table 6). Sindh 

Province among all four Provinces has been severely affected from 

flooding throughout the flooding history of Pakistan. The high level of 

flood damages in Sindh Province is mainly due to the encroachment of 

people to the flood plain area and also due to the Sindh’s agricultural 

based economy which is always vulnerable to flooding as Indus River is 

flowing in the middle of the Province. According to PDMA Sindh 

(2011), the 2010 flooding had affected 15 of 23 districts, in which 7 

(Jacobabad, Kambar, Kashmore, Shikarpur, Dadu, Thatta and Jamshoro) 

were almost ruined (Table 7). Following are the sectorial damages of the 

flood through the Sindh province in 2010 flooding. 

Impacts on Housing 

The housing sector in the only Sindh province was completely ruined as 

about 1 million houses were damaged (Table 8). Out of these damaged 

houses 66% were completely demolished, while the remaining damaged 

houses were not even able to use as shelter to live (WFP, 2010; PDMA 

Sindh, 2011). Among the most disastrous districts, district Jacobabad, 

Shikarpur and Thatta were in the province as almost all the houses were 

demolished due to (PDMA Sindh, 2011). 

Impacts on Basic public services and Infrastructure 

Basic public services and infrastructures for any society is the main 

source of interacting to the rest of the world. The extent of 2010 

flooding did not stick to housing only but it had resulted in extensive 

damages to schools, roads and bridges, telephone lines and electric 

supply lines (Table 8). Due to such damages, the flood victims were 

completely isolated from the rest of the country which resulted in the 

delay of relief and rehabilitation process. Similarly hand pump or tube 

wells were completely out of order due to clogging with silts and salts. 

As a result, the people had no choice but to use or drink the 

contaminated water (WFP, 2010). 

Impacts on Agriculture and Livestock 

People of the Sindh province are mainly dependent on the agriculture 

and livestock, particularly in the rural area of the province. In agricultural 

sector, the backbone of the province’s economy is mainly depending on 

cotton, rice, maize and vegetables. The flooding in 2010 was 

unprecedented as it had severely damaged the agricultural sector and 

livestock of the Sindh province (WFP, 2010). In fact, the flooding struck 

the province at stage when the crop of cotton, rice, maize and vegetables 

were about to harvest. This resulted a financial loss in billions PKR to 

the province (Table 8). Due to such damages people had lost their 

source of income and were in need of support from the government and 

other relief and rehabilitation agencies. 

Impacts on Socio-Economic and Health Units 

Flood 2010 resulted in severe socio-economic and Health problems 

(Table 8). Basic, district and regional health facilities were also severely 

18


damaged. Apart of this, people were hit by water borne diseases as there 

was no clean water for drinking and cooking etc. They had no choice to 

avoid the contaminated water for their daily use. 

Impacts on Indus River Morphology 

The morphology of the Indus River has changed due to the flood as unregulated 

flow of river was observed during the flood. The un-pattern 

flow was mainly due to the erosions and widening of the river courses. 

The training works along the river banks/courses need to be rebuilt at 

high standards to minimize the flood damages in future (PDMA Sindh, 

2011). 

Table 6: Comparison of flood 2010 with other disasters in the world 

(NDMA, 2011) 

Table 7: Damages in Sindh province due to flood 2010 (PDMA 

Sindh, 2011) 

Type of Damage 

No. 

Villages Affected 11,992 

Persons Affected 7,254,355 

Houses Damaged 876,240 

Persons Died 414 

Total Number of Persons Displaced and registered in 

Govt. Relief Camps 

1,821,479 

Table 8: Sectorial losses due flood 2010 in Sindh (PDMA Sindh, 

2011) 

Sector 

Physical Loss 

Agriculture 2,894,551 M.Tons 136.20 

Livestock 191,311 Nos. 11.44 

Housing 1,021,000 units 134.34 

Roads 8061 kms(411 Bridges/Culverts) 35.67 

Irrigation Not reported 52.00 

Health 100 no of health units at District level 3.90 

Education 4602 School Buildings 30.56 

Urban/Municipal 

Infrastructures 

Government 

Infrastructures 

Total Financial Loss 

Not reported 40.00 

Not Reported 10.00 

Financial Loss 

(PKR. In Billion) 

454.11 

(5.28 Billion US$) 

19


Figure 18: Disaster management plan after 2010 flooding (NDMA, 

2011) 

Relief and Rehabilitation Process 

Historically the relief and rehabilitation process in Pakistan has never 

been integrated with the country’s core planning and management. In 

fact the whole process was malfunctioning due to lack of coordination 

among the government agencies, which were related to disaster 

management. Since 2010, National Disaster Management Commission 

has been constituted by the Government of Pakistan (Fig. 18) to 

monitor and oversee the pre and post disaster spectrum by organizing 

the activities of the national, provincial and international bodies for 

better management of any disaster including flood (NDMA, 2011). 

Following are the departments at national and provincial level which play 

a vital role in the relief and rehabilitation process (FFC, 2010). 

National Disaster Management Authority 

Provincial Disaster Management Authorities 

Emergency Relief Cell 

Army Relief Wing 

National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) 

NDMA is the core body in the National Disaster Management 

Commission (NDMC), as it has coordination link with all wings of the 

commission. NDMA came into existence in 2007 as a federal authority 

to manage the pre and post phase of all type of disasters. NDMA has got 

more responsibility after implementation of NDMC in 2010 with the aim 

to work as a central body to interact with all stakeholders at national (e.g. 

federal ministries, Armed forces, WAPDA, PMD), provincial (PDMC 

and provincial departments) & international (e.g. UNO, International 

donors, International NGOs) level and also to interact with other 

stakeholders (e.g. Ministries) to minimize the risk and vulnerability in the 

country by implementation of disaster management strategies. Apart of 

this, NDMA has the role to prepare, implement and monitor the disaster 

management plans and provide necessary support to the PDMA and 

other provincial departments. Moreover, NDMA furnish technical and 

manpower support to the provinces in case of any disaster. Last but not 

least, NDMA arrange seminars or programs to educate people about the 

20


natural disasters and provide necessary training as well, to reduce the 

extent of damages in any drastic situation (NDMA, 2011). 

Provincial Disaster Management Authorities (PDMA) 

PDMA is established to carry out pre and post disaster management 

activities at the province level. The authority works under the guidance 

of PDMC and coordinate with the NDMA and other relief agencies. 

DDMA, District Disaster Management Authorities, are the lower wings 

of the PDMA to inform the people about all sort of disaster with the 

help of district management departments and to execute the relief and 

rehabilitation process at the grass roots level. The role of the DDMA is 

most critical in the whole disaster management as it bridge the gap 

between the national, provincial disaster management authorities and the 

local community (FFC, 2010). 

Emergency Relief Cell (ERC) 

ERC is part of Cabinet Division and is mainly responsible to plan and 

assess the relief works. Relief works generally include provision of goods 

(tents, medicines, drinking water, blankets etc) to the flood victims. ERC 

generally ask the international and national aid agencies to pledge 

funding for the relief and rehabilitation works (FFC, 2010). 

Pak Army Relief Wing 

Pakistan Army relief wing has always played a vital role in the relief and 

rehabilitation process. The Pak Army relief wing is mainly responsible to 

help out the civil authorities in the rescue and relief operations. For such 

operations, the relief wing gets the financial and human resources 

support from the Provincial governments. Pak Army’s relief wing in 

flooding situation, carry out the relief and rescue operations based on 

three phase strategy i.e. Pre-flood, flood phase and post flood phase. The 

Pre-flood phase is the preparatory phase in which the Pak Army 

evacuate the people from the flood vulnerable areas (after receiving the 

flood warning) and construct the flood fighting barriers mainly through 

sandbags. Apart of this, Pak Army inspects the serviceability of all 

hydraulic structure (i.e. bunds, barrages, spurs etc) against the flood. In 

case of any deficiency, the concerned Provincial Irrigation Departments 

are informed to mitigate the flood situation. During this process, the 

rescue and relief wing keeps a constant coordination with NDMA and 

FFD to take appropriate actions in areas which are highly vulnerable to 

flood. In the post flood phase, units of Pak Army provide all necessary 

support in relief works to normalize the flood affected areas to its pre 

flood situation e.g. construction of relief camps, providing of relief 

goods, logistic support to people and aid agencies (FFC, 2010). 

Watan Card Scheme 

Watan card scheme is initiated by the federal government of Pakistan to 

the victims of flooding in 2010. Watan card is actually a Relief card, 

which is the early relief compensation to the flood victims with a worth 

of PKR 100000 (i.e. 1150 USD or 8000 SEK). The card is giving to the 

head of the family and also to any family member of at least 18 years of 

age. However, such person must have a valid National Identity card to 

proof his/her identity. Otherwise it’s not possible for anyone to get any 

relief compensation from the government agencies. National Database 

and Registration Authority (NADRA) of Pakistan issue the Watan cards 

to the eligible flood victims. Since flooding 2010 more than 160 

thousands of Watan cards have been distributed with a worth of 141 

USD millions (Table 9). 

21


Table 9: Watan card distribution Province/Territory wise (NDMA, 

2011) 

Province/ Territory 

Number of Watan 

Cards Distributed 

(Approx) 

Azad Jammu & Kashmir 11133 3 

Gilgit Baltistan 9382 2 

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa 258909 55 

Balochistan 123658 26 

Punjab 608825 141 

Sindh 658650 143 

Overall 1670557 370 

Cash Distributed 

USD millions (Approx) 

METHODS 

The study is mainly focused on the problems of flooding in Pakistan, its 

relief and rehabilitation process in the Sindh Province. The study has two 

folds i.e. background studies and field work. For background studies, 

secondary sources have been used to review the flooding and its 

mitigation measures that have been done by the Pakistani authorities 

since 1947, while for field work a field survey has conducted in three 

districts of Sindh Province to examine the relief and rehabilitation 

process. 

The field work was conducted between in the month of February 2011. 

Field work was composed of Survey in relief camps, interviews with 

policy makers, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and aid 

agencies. In the survey, four relief camps were surveyed in the three 

districts (i.e. Kotri, Thatta and Larkana) of Sindh Province. The survey 

and interviews were conducted by the authors. In this regards, lack of 

financial and human resources were the major factors which limited the 

survey to four relief camps only. 

The method of the survey was based on the cross sectional research 

approach while the questionnaires were based on the open ended 

questions. A total of 752 people of 126 families have participated in the 

survey. These people were living in relief camp No K1, K2, T1 and L1 

(Appendix A). It is important to mention here that the questionnaires 

were circulated to number of groups of different age of people, who had 

participated in survey and discussed the flooding, relief and rehabilitation 

process with the authors (Fig. 19 to 24). 

Figure 19: Flood victims waiting for the relief 

22


The geographical spread was observed in the relief camps, as a result the 

respondents were divided into urban and rural area when the survey was 

completed. Out of total respondents, in the camps, about 62 percent 

were displaced from the rural areas of the Sindh Province. 41 percent of 

the respondents have school level of education and 45 percent of the 

people have no schooling at all. Similarly only 10 percent of people have 

college and 3 percent of people have only university level educations. 

While regarding source of earning, 40 percent of the flood affected 

people in the camps were dependent on agricultural sectors and 35 

percent are household persons. The remaining percent of people have 

low portion of percentage in different sectors. 

Figure 20: Temporary housing arrangements for the flood victims 

without any proper facilities of drinking water and sanitation 

Figure 21: Flood victim's relief camp 

Figure 22: Discussion with flood victims about relief and 

rehabilitation 

23


The questionnaires were mainly designed to collect information about 

the basic demographic information (Appendix A), extent of flood 

damages, health issues, financial support from the government and non 

government agencies and the process of rehabilitation. Each interview 

from the NGOs, Policy makers and aid agencies generally took a 

minimum of half an hour time. The respondents were also allowed to 

provide additional information if they deemed relevant to the flooding, 

its relief and rehabilitation process. The collected information from the 

flooded area was assessed to determine the short-comings in the relief 

and rehabilitation process. The responses of people to the questionnaires 

are translated into English language and are provided in the results 

section. 

Figure 23: Flood victims enrolling their national Identity cards to 

be able to get Watan /relief compensation cards (Watan cards) 

from Government agencies 

Figure 24: Discussion with women about their problems in relief 

camps 

24


RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS 

Analysis of the responses of flood affected people in the field survey 

The results of the field survey is presented and analyzed below which 

represent the real picture of the relief and rehabilitation process that has 

been established after the experience of 2010 flood in Sindh Province. 

Undoubtedly flood is a natural event but proper preparedness for such 

event can minimize the extent of damages. In this regards, flood 

forecasting and warning system play an important role in the mitigation 

of flood. However, it is important as well to disseminate the flood 

warnings across flood prone areas on time to reduce the social and 

economic losses. It is worthy to mention here, that people from both 

rural and urban areas were living together in the relief camps and there 

was no class distinction between rural and urban areas. The response of 

the flood affected people in rural areas shows that the 60 percent of the 

people were informed at a time when they had only one hour to respond 

to the most devastating flood event in the history of Pakistan (Fig. 25). 

Similarly, only 5 percent of people had information that flood is about to 

struck their place while 10 percent have 3 days and quarter percent had 

only 24 hours to respond. However, the situation was quite different as 

all of the urban areas people were informed at least 24 hours before the 

flood event to happen in their districts. Similarly, the response of the 

people of urban areas shows that 50 percent of the people had 1 week, 

35 percent had 3 days and 15 percent had 25 hours time to respond to 

the flood. The picture of flood warning receiving shows the clear 

difference of lifestyle between the rural and urban areas of the Sindh 

Province. It is quite strange that even 50 percent of people from urban 

areas did not respond enough to keep away their goods from the flood. 

During the discussion with the flood victims, the authors came to know, 

that either lack of resources or lack of education, about how to respond 

in flood situation, was the main reason that they could not responded 

properly in flood situation even after having flood warnings information 

of about 1 week, particularly people from urban. Apart of the flood 

warnings, the statistics about the source of information regarding flood 

warnings, it is quite alarming as the government agencies did not manage 

to keep in touch with the people of rural areas while in urban areas they 

had just managed to 20 percent of people (Fig. 26). Though television 

and newspaper played important role, to keep the people aware about 

the flood situation, in the urban areas but in rural areas people did not 

have access to TV and newspaper. 25 percent of the people from rural 

areas had got the flood warnings information through radio and NGOs. 

However, relatives, feudals played important role in rural areas as they 

managed to inform 35 % people. It can be said, that people in the rural 

areas are socially well integrated with each other as compared to urban 

areas, which could be due to many reasons, but such network play 

important role as a source of information in any part of the world. 

However, the extent of damages in the 2010’s flood is very huge as 

compared to the flood history of Pakistan (Table 1). Similarly, in the 

study area, the extent of flood damage is very severe in the rural areas as 

compared to the response of people from the urban areas in the relief 

camps (Fig. 27). 

Human losses, though there is difference of only two percent between 

the rural and urban areas but the financial losses is quite huge, as 90 

percent of standing crops were flooded, which were ready for the 

harvesting but only 20 percent crops had damaged of people who are 

living in the urban areas. Up to 30 percent people from urban areas have 

25


lost a crop area of 5 to 25 acres while people from rural areas have lost 5 

to 15 acres crop areas (Appendix B). The situation in the livestock 

damages is not much different than the agricultural damages in the rural 

area. The percentage difference is 60 between rural and urban areas. The 

livestock was severely damaged by the flooding both in rural and urban 

areas. The livestock damages include mainly the killing of buffalos, goats 

and cow both in rural and urban areas (Appendix B). The extent of 

house damages in both urban and rural areas were very high as the 

flooding hit the 95 and 60 percent of the houses in rural and urban areas, 

respectively (Fig. 27). The health issues are the most vulnerable as 95 

percent people from the rural areas and 70 percent from the urban areas 

had hit by the water borne diseases (Fig. 28). People in the relief camps 

still do not have clean water for drinking and in fact there were still flood 

water ponds around the relief camps which are causing health problems 

to the flood victims. Apart of water borne diseases, some pregnant 

women and old people are looking forward to get extra health care. 

Figure 25: Comparison of flood warning receiving between urban 

and rural areas 

Figure 26: Comparison of flood warning's sources between urban 


26


Figure 27: Comparison of extent of flood damages between urban 


Figure 28: Comparison of water borne diseases between urban and 

rural areas 

The flood victim’s views about the worth of Watan Card as part of relief 

compensation were categorized into three levels i.e. very good, good and 

not enough (Fig. 29). 65 percent of the people from rural areas thought 

that these cards are very good as relief compensation, 20 percent 

considered the Watan card is good enough but 15 percent said that the 

relief compensation they get through these Watan cards are not enough 

to survive as they have big family and they have lost everything in the 

flood. Similarly, only 5 percent people from the urban areas thoughts 

that these cards are very good as relief compensation, 40 percent 

considered the Watan cards are good to survive. However, 55 percent 

said that the relief compensation is not enough for them to get back to 

their pre flood situation. 

The reason of high percentage of negative thoughts about the Watan 

cards in urban areas, probably because of the high cost of living in urban 

areas as compared to the rural areas. These were the thoughts of people 

who got the Watan cards but there were many people who are still 

waiting for the government agencies to give them the Watan cards. The 

reason could be due to the condition of receiving the relief card, i.e. the 

person must be at age of 18 and must have a valid national identity card 

to get the relief card. But as the flood victims did not have enough time 

27


to respond the flooding as they were not informed on time about 

flooding, so the people had to save their lives rather saving livestock, 

important documents etc. It is obvious, that the people did not know 

that they will get the relief support or compensation on the basis of 

National Identity cards otherwise they would have saved their national 

identity cards too. Another thing which is also important to mention 

here that as most of the flood victims have lost their houses then how 

they could bring their national identity cards from their houses to get the 

Watan cards. 

Figure 29: Comparison of flood victim's views about Watan cards 

between urban and rural areas 

Figure 30: Comparison of flood victim's views about relief and 

rehabilitation process in urban and rural areas 

Figure 31: Comparison of flood victim's views about time frame for 

rehabilitation process between urban and rural areas 

28


Figure 32: Comparison of burning issues in urban and rural areas 

Figure 33: Comparison of willingness about moving back to flood 

damaged areas in urban and rural areas 

In spite of the fact, that governmental authorities have issued more than 

1.6 million Watan/Relief cards but the authors think that the 

government should make some change in their policy about relief cards 

so that the flood victims get the respectable money to re-start their 

routine life. Due to such hurdles, 30 percent of the people from urban 

and only 5 percent of the people from rural affected areas think that the 

relief and rehabilitation process is on the track as they have got relief 

goods from the government agencies, NGOs and civil societies but the 

rest of the people have not been able to get anything from these sources 

(Fig. 30). 60 percent and 65 percent people from urban and rural areas, 

respectively, think that the relief and rehabilitation process will take at 

least 1-2 years additionally, while 35 and 20 percent people from urban 

and rural areas, respectively, thinks that it will take 2-3 years more (Fig. 

31). However, 15 and 5 percent of rural and urban areas, respectively, 

thinks that as the governmental agencies are not fulfilling their 

responsibilities and as result the relief and rehabilitation work will be 

going on for longer period. 

As the people are still not getting relief support from the government, on 

time, there is an acute shortage of drinking water, goods for food, 

medicines, clothes and shelter. 80 percent in urban and 85 percent 

people of rural area are in need of these goods as part of relief support. 

While 20 percent in urban and 15 percent in rural areas are in need of 

additional money and transport service so that they could buy goods 

from the markets and could support their self until they find jobs to 

improve their life (Fig.32). When the authors asked about their 

29


willingness to go back to the pre flooded area, almost all were ready to 

go back to the flood affect areas but with certain conditions. As per 

condition 1, 90 and 60 percent of the urban and rural area people said 

that if the government provides enough money so that they re-build 

their houses then they are ready to move to flood damaged area. While 

as per condition 2, 10 and 40 percent of the people from urban and rural 

areas said that it is better to find job in the surrounding areas of the relief 

camp instead of going back to the damaged houses and flooded areas 

because next year the flood will come again and they will be displaced to 

another locations, as the government do not pay any attention to the 

flooded area to be protected by appropriate measures from the next 

flood season (Fig. 33). 

Analysis of the responses of NGOs and aid agencies 

NGOs and aid agencies were contacted later after completing the survey 

in the relief camps with the intention to evaluate how they look into the 

whole process of relief and rehabilitation process and to find out why 

they could not contribute very well in the whole process (Appendix C 

and D). 

Most of the officials from NGOs and aid agencies also were agreed that 

the relief and rehabilitation process is very slow and it will take at least 1 

to 2 years more as the millions of people are displaced from their homes 

and the extent of flood damages are quite huge if compared to the recent 

natural disasters. But they have also pointed out that in some part of the 

rural area in Sindh province, some feudals/landlords and politicians have 

deliberately diverted the flow of floodwater towards such areas which 

were announced as safe place from the flood, to protect their own 

agricultural lands. Here it can easily be said, that the flooding in that 

particular non vulnerable area to flooding was due to the deliberately 

breaching of embankments/leaves and it would be unfair to blame the 

summer monsoon rainfall or climate change. According to officials from 

NGOs and aid agencies, that government is not fully supporting them 

particularly in providing security at time when distributing the relief 

goods in the flood affected people as it is hard for them to manage 

hundreds of people, who are deliberately in need of food, shelters, 

medicines and especially the clean drinking water. They believe that such 

miserable situation is actually occurred as a result of not fairly 

distributing the goods among the flood victims. In fact, many people are 

still waiting for the Watan/relief cards to get from the governmental 

agencies. However, officials from NGOs and aid agencies have also 

appreciate that the Watan/relief card is good approach for providing 

relief compensation to the flood victims and hopefully the flood affected 

people will get back to their pre-flood situation as soon as they get the 

relief cards. But they suggested that the governmental agencies should 

make some changes in the rules of getting Watan cards. According to 

them, the road infrastructure is mostly damaged due to flood and as a 

result it is very hard for them to reach to the flood victims to help them 

out. The NGOs staff suggested that the governmental agencies either 

provide the goods through NGOs or through the local prominent 

persons who have good credibility in the flood affected people. Similarly, 

the pressing action should be to keep the political leaders out of the 

process of relief and rehabilitation as most of them do not have good 

standing among the people and in fact, such political leaders just 

distribute the relief goods among those flood victims who have 

membership of their political parties. 

30


Analysis of the responses of Policy makers 

Policy makers and staff of the governmental agencies for relief and 

rehabilitation were contacted as well to compare their views with the 

views of flood victims, NGOs and aid agencies for the purpose to know 

the quality level of relief and rehabilitation process (Appendix E). 

According to them that all the efforts (both electronic and print media) 

were utilized to inform the people about the flood forecasting and 

warnings but there are some areas in the rural areas where people do not 

have access to both electronic and print media. However, in such areas 

local authorities informed the people through telephonic service and 

crisis management teams who visited the rural areas. In this regards, local 

organization of the villages/rural areas were involved but for rural area 

there was not enough time so that they could save their livestock and 

household goods. According to policy makers, distribution of relief 

goods among people was also a big problem for them, as they were not 

ready at least for such a big natural disaster. In other words they were 

accepting that the relief and rehabilitation work is out of their capacity 

due to the fact that this was a catastrophic event and as a result the relief 

and rehabilitation process has been slow They accepted that the relief 

goods did not reach on time to flood victims due to damaged of the road 

infrastructures and also ponding of flood water. According to them, that 

during the flood, most of people are affected in those areas where the 

population density is very high as people do not pay attention to family 

planning as a result, people from such areas who got the Watan/relief 

cards are not happy with the government relief compensations. It is hard 

for policy makers to manage the flood victims because most of the 

people are not educated and are ill mannered. The policy makers were 

insisting that the Watan card is enough for one family as these people 

also getting the relief goods from government agencies and also from 

other sources too. Policy makers believes that there are some people 

who are pretending of being victim of flood, but in fact, such people are 

living in those cities which were not affected by flood, as a result they are 

affecting the whole process of relief and rehabilitation. Regarding the 

health issues, they were also agreed that the people are still at risk of 

water borne diseases as the government is facing shortage of medicines 

and medical staff so that to speed up the medical service for the flood 

victims. They have appreciated the efforts of NGOs and aid agencies. 

Policy makers strongly suggested that the government should initiate 

high level of programs to enhance the capacity of the crisis management 

teams and also initiate flood awareness programs for people so that to 

make relief and rehabilitation process speedy and effective in future. 

Analysis of flood mitigation measures 

Pakistan has been the victim of monsoon flooding throughout its 

history. The occurrence of flood event in Pakistan since 1947 till 2011 is 

24 times with an average of a flood per 2.66 years. The analysis of the 

history of the flood damages in Pakistan reveals that the areal extents of 

damage was high in 1956, 1977 and in the 2010. Similarly financial 

damages were extremely high in 2010 while the human losses were high 

in 1950, 1977, 1992 and 2010.The highest number of villages is affected 

in the 2011 flood, which was due to the fact that this flooding was only 

occurred in the rural area of Sindh province where the number of 

villages is very high. It is surprising that the Pakistani water managers 

and policy makers did not pay attention to the flood events till 1977, 

which could be due to lack of resources and may be the efforts were 

diverted due to three major wars (1948, 1965 and 1971) with India. The 

31


government initiated flood protection measures under the umbrella of 

FFC for every 10 years. However, the large numbers of human losses 

was occurred even in 1992 flood, which brought the attention of the 

water managers into the improvement in the flood forecasting and 

warning system. Then again the high level of flood occurred in 2010 and 

the water policy makers and managers are now again trying to bring 

some changes in the mitigation measures. It can easily be said that the 

flood mitigation measures of the Pakistani government is retroactive 

rather than proactive, as the government starts to improve the flood 

mitigation measures after flood events, though it is good enough that the 

changes have come after the flood struck e.g. 1977, 1992. According to 

Tariq and Van de Giesen, 2011, that there has been a decreasing 

tendency in the death toll in flooding event from 1950 till 2099, which 

could be due to flood control measures (Fig. 5). It is also important to 

mention here that due to such flood mitigation measures the ratio 

between the human losses in flood to the exposure of people to flood is 

lower than the India, China, Bangladesh and Afghanistan (Tariq and Van 

de Giesen, 2011). 

FFC water policy is mainly depending on structural measures to 

minimize the flooding events, as billions of USD has been invested for 

construction of small dams, barrages but even then such measures are 

not useful enough to avoid the flooding situation. The reason could be 

because of the fact that major dams in Pakistan are mainly using for 

irrigation purpose and power generation (Tariq and Van de Giesen, 

2011). The alarming point is that Pakistan does not have enough water 

storage reservoirs to store the excess water in the monsoon season to 

avoid flooding event and drought situation as well, because before the 

flood 2010 the country was facing drought and shortage of water. If FFC 

had built major dams to store the water, they would have avoided the 

flood 2010 and would have saved big financial and human loss. 

According to Tariq and Van de Giesen, 2011, that Pakistan has not been 

able to construct big reservoirs since Tarbela dam i.e. 1974, as political 

leaders have politicized the matter. In fact, they have created inter 

provincial disputes over the share of water for their vested interests 

which is the most controversial hurdle for the FFC to solve. Pakistan 

could solve the flood problem and as well as the energy crisis if the 

country save huge amount of excess water which flows straightaway to 

the Arabian Sea. The need is here to build major dams to store the water 

of the flood and Indus River as Pakistan is getting 56% of the water 

from the Indus River, otherwise the country will face water shortage in 

near future as Pakistan is one of the water scarce countries. 

In terms of climate, Pakistan is vulnerable to flood in the monsoon/ 

summer season. To minimize this factor, Pakistan needs an effective 

flood forecasting and warning system. As a matter of fact, the 

government has paid attention to upgrade the of weather technology 

right after the 1992 devastating flood event. However, PMD is still 

lacking of advance technology to forecast the flash flooding. If PMD had 

upgraded the flood forecasting they would have played a vital role in 

reducing the damages due to 2010 flash plus riverine type of flooding. It 

was observed in the 2010 flooding, that the PMD’s flood early warning 

system even for riverine flood forecasting did not work significantly as 

there was not enough time for the authorities to evacuate the people 

right after the issuance of flood warning. The reasons behind the late 

issuance of flood warning could be others too but one reason could be 

that the PMD’s riverine flood forecasting is mainly dependent on the 

secondary hydrological data, which they get from the WAPDA and 

32


Irrigation departments. So such hydrological data is required to be 

handed over on time and should be authentic too as most of the 

hydrological stations are man-operating and there is always a chance of 

human error. According to the PMD report that that the weather 

forecasting ability of this department was malfunctioning during the 

flooding 2010, as many of their meteorological stations were partially or 

fully damaged soon after the beginning of the 2010 flooding (WMO, 

2010). 

The alarming point is that the population growth rate of the country is 

very high as country’s population is now 180 millions with rare practice 

of city planning. Due to this reason, the people are used to move to 

places where they can expect socio-economic benefits, without paying 

any attention to the climatic vulnerability of the area. In city planning, 

flood hazard map is an important part, however FFC has not yet paid 

any serious attention to make the authentic flood hazard maps so that to 

restrict the movement of the people haphazardly. Additionally, the 

morphology of the rivers need be studied and particularly the Indus 

River, as flood like 2010 bring huge amount of sediments which make 

changes in the river course and also deteriorate the capacity of a 

hydraulic structures. The re-study of the river morphology and crosssections 

of the rivers will also be helpful in measurement of water 

discharge at certain location in the rivers. If FFC once managed to 

implement the flood hazard maps then it is important to educate the 

people so that the people should avoid living in such floodplain area. 

The people who are living in the riverine area could also be resettled in 

safe residential places by providing alternative source of income as many 

of them are dependent on the river water to use it for agriculture and 

fishing purpose. Such action could be possible if FFC spend more 

money on the flood awareness among the people by initiating flood 

awareness programs so that the people have an idea how to respond in 

the flood crisis and to support the flood crisis management teams rather 

than creating problems in implementation of relief and rehabilitation 

process. 

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS 

Conclusion 

Flooding and its rehabilitation process need a comprehensive approach 

to deal with it and particularly in the Indus River Basin System when it 

couple with uneven monsoon precipitations. Flooding is undoubtedly a 

natural disaster, even the developed countries have failed to counteract 

in spite of all preparations. The historical flood events in Pakistan are 

mainly connected to the uneven monsoon rainfall with devastating 

consequences that have raised serious questions about the flood 

management strategies. Undoubtedly, it can be said that mitigations 

measures, of the Pakistani policy makers and water mangers against the 

flooding, are retroactive rather than proactive. The mitigation measures 

have been around construction of hydraulic structures but over sighted 

the importance of authentic flood hazard mapping and its 

implementations, study of the rivers morphology, improvement of flood 

forecasting & warning system and definitely much attention should have 

been paid to the coordination system between the FFD and relief 

agencies. Apart of these, the importance of people have never been 

recognized which could play a useful role if they get awareness about 

flood hazards, relief and rehabilitation process. However, the county’s 

high population growth, varied climate and socio economic conditions 

33


are the issues which make the management of flood events, relief and 

rehabilitation works more tangled. Relief and rehabilitation process 

cannot be executed smoothly and transparently without involving of 

local people as even though approximately USD 370 million has been 

distributed in flood victims but still many of the flood victims are 

looking to get the Watan/relief cards, which obviously have raised the 

question about the transparency of relief compensations. Pakistan, being 

an agriculture based economy country cannot withstand with such 

frequent flood events and thus there is an urgent need of change in flood 

mitigation strategies based on the short comings of 2010 flood. It is 

important that the future flood mitigation measures should be good 

enough to integrate into the Indus River basin systems, which will 

contribute positively in the socio-economic development in the Sindh 

Province. 

Recommendations 

Following are short comings in the Pakistan’s flood mitigation policy, 

which considerably need improvement to mitigate the flood events, and 

to reduce the relief and rehabilitation’s problems. 

Technical and Management Issues 

Preparation and implementation of flood hazard maps, particularly in 

Sindh province should be done on urgent basis as Indus River 

passing through the centre of the province. 

Flood control and flood early warning system (FEWS) need to be 

updated. Apart of this, meteorological radars should be installed 

throughout the country instead of focusing only the developed 

areas/cities. 

Advance technology should be utilized to able the PMD to forecast 

both flash and riverine flooding. 

Maintenance of the hydraulic structures should be done on regular 

basis as flooding transport large amount of sediments along its 

course, which reduce the capacity of the hydraulic structure. 

The benefits of the flooding should be increased by creating storage 

reservoirs which could help in solving the energy crisis by using the 

excess water for irrigation and power generation purpose. 

Coordinated flood management approach is weak, which needs 

improvement, particularly coordination between PMD, WAPDA and 

Irrigation departments. 

The river morphology need to be studied, at least once in two 

monsoon seasons and must be studied after every future flood event, 

and floodplain maps should be prepared accordingly. 

Flood management should be proactive and need to be integrated with 

Indus River basin system. 

People who are living in the flood hazard zone should be compensated 

in the process of re-settlement 

Awareness Programs 

Flood awareness programs need to be initiated in areas which are 

vulnerable to recurrent flooding. Apart of this, both electronic and 

print media could be very useful to aware the people about flood 

hazard. 

34


Local people should be trained for all kind of hazards and particularly 

for the flood response so that people work as a facilitative in the 

relief and rehabilitation process rather than problematic. 

National flood insurance program need to be initiated for those houses 

or businesses which are located in flood prone areas, which would 

indirectly bring the awareness in the people towards flood hazards 

and on other hand it will be helpful for rebuilding the businesses and 

houses after the flood event. 

Relief and Rehabilitations 

Need of coordination is required between the NGOs and Government 

agencies 

The provision of relief compensation to the affected people should be 

transparent so that well-off people come forward in support of relief 

and rehabilitation process. 

Logistic support should be provided to the civil society to make it easy 

for people who want to participate in the relief or rehabilitation 

process. 

Safety of the NGOs staff should be increased. 

Government should provide relief compensation to the affected 

people through non political leaders, for the purpose to avoid 

mismanagement and to improve transparency in the relief works. 

Incentives should be given to the local contractors so that 

rehabilitation process make faster (e.g. Income tax waiver on all 

rehabilitation works). 

35


REFERENCES 

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Assessment in Pakistan. Pakistan Engineering Congress, 71 st Annual 

Sessions Proceedings, pp. 697-707 

Akhtar S. 2011. The South Asiatic Monsoon and Flood Hazards in the 

Indus River Basin, Pakistan. Journal of Basic and Applied Sciences 

Vol. 7, No. 2, pp. 101-115 

FFC, 2010. Annual Flood Report 2010, Ministry of Water and Power, 

Islamabad, Pakistan 

Fahlbusch H., Schultz B. and Thatte C.D., 2004. In: The Indus Basin: 

History of Irrigation, Drainage and Flood Management, pp. 389, 

ICID Publication, New Delhi 

Gaurav K., Sinha R. and Panda P.K., 2011. The Indus flood of 2010 in 

Pakistan: a perpective analysis using remote sensing data. Journal of 

Natural Hazards, Vol. 59, Issue No. 3, pp. 1815-1826. 

Hussain, M.S. and Lee, S., 2009. A Classification of Rainfall Regions in 

Pakistan. Journal of the Korean Geographical society, Vol. 44, Issue 

No. 5, pp. 605-623 

Impact Forecasting , 2010. Pakistan Flood Event Recap Report, Aon 

Benfield 

NDMA, 2011.National Disaster Management Authority, Annaul Report 

2010. Prime Minister's Secretariat, Islamabad, Pakistan. 

PDMA Sindh, 2011. Sindh Provincial Monsoon/Floods Contingency 

Plan 2011 (Draft Version 1.0).Goverment of Sindh, Rehabilitation 

Department, Provincial Disaster Management Authority 

PMD, 2011. Flood Routing Model. Pakistan Meteorological Department, 


PMD, 2010. Monsoon Tracks. Pakistan Meteorological Department, 


SUPARCO and FAO, 2011. Pakistan Rain/Flood 2011 Report on Flash 

floods, breaches in canals and damage to infrastructure & agriculture 

sectors in Sind Province 

Tariq, M.A.U.R. and Van de Giesen, N., 2011. Floods and flood 

management in Pakistan. Physics and Chemistry of the Earth, Parts 

A/B/C.Vol. 47–48, pp 11–20 

UNHABITAT, 2010. Monsoon Flood 2010 Pakistan: Rapid Technical 

Assessment of Damage and Needs for Reconstruction in Housing 

Sector, Pakistan 

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Administration 

WFP, 2010. Pakistan Floods Impact Assessment, September 2010 

Report, World Food Programme, Pakistan 

WMO, 2010. World Meterological Organization Fact-Finding and 

Needs-Assessment Mission to Pakistan, Mission Report, Islamabad. 

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Review. (Online), Available: http://www.icid.org/i_d_pakistan.pdf 

(Retrieved August 2011) 

Integrated Project FLOODsite Website http://www.floodsite.net 

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Land and Water Resources Engineering, School of Architecture and the 

Built Environment, KTH Website 

http://www.kth.se/abe/inst/lwr/publ?l=en_UK 

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http://ndma.gov.pk/Documents/NIDM/NIDM%20COurses/Floo 

d%20Mitigation%2015- 

19%20Feb%202010/Flood%20disaster%20risk%20situations%20in 

%20Pakistan.pdf (Retrieved July 2011) 

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2011) 

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http://www.eoearth.org/article/Water_profile_of_Pakistan (Retrieved 

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World Water Week Website http://www.worldwaterweek.org/ 

37


APPENDICES 

A. Flood affected people in study area of Sindh province, assessment of 

basic demographic information 

District Kotri Thatta Larkana 

Camp No K1 K2 T1 L1 

1.Gender 

Male 43 64 90 216 

Female 33 47 66 193 

Total 76 111 156 409 

Urban area's victims out of total 17 23 43 197 

Rural area's victims out of total 59 88 113 212 

2. Age 

17 years and below 34 52 72 220 

18 – 30 years 12 21 41 68 

31 – 45 23 29 27 89 

46 years and above 7 9 16 32 

Total 76 111 156 409 

3. Marital status 

Single (above 17 years) 9 15 27 53 

Married (having children) 12 17 23 47 

Married (having no children) 4 3 1 19 

Widow/Widower/ no family members 1 4 9 16 

Total 26 39 60 135 

4. Education Level 

School 31 42 67 172 

College 4 3 10 57 

University 0 1 5 21 

No education 41 65 74 159 

Total 76 111 156 409 

5. Source of Income ( Before flooding) 

Job 3 4 17 53 

Agriculture 20 38 63 162 

Fishing 2 3 13 31 

Business 1 2 9 27 

Household 21 34 54 136 

Total 47 81 156 409 

I


Questions 

B. Questionnaire response from the flood victims 

Flood warning: When did you 

know that flood is coming? 

Source of information: From 

which source of information you 

used flood warning? 

Flood damages: What did you 

lose in this flood? (Any family 

member, crops, lands, animals 

etc) 

Time frame for rehabilitation: 

What do you think that how long 

time will it take to come back on 

the pre flood life conditions with 

the Relief compensations, 

PKR.100000= USD 1100= 8000 

SEK, which is providing by 

government for relief and 

rehabilitation? 

Willingness to go back to 

floodplain area: Do you want to 

go back to your houses and 

villages? 

Health issues: Is there anybody 

in your family who is ill due to 

water born diseases? 

Relief work: Do you think that 

NGOs, aid agencies and 

government are really working in 

proper way for the relief and 

rehabilitation? 

Agricultural and Livestock 

damages: How much agricultural 

land and animals have you lost? 

Short coming in relief work: 

What kind of big problem do you 

have now? 

Response 

Urban Area 

50% knew one week in advance 

35% knew 72 hours in advance 


15 % Government agencies 

75% Television and newspaper 

10% Ngo´s 

0% lost family member 

20% lost crops 

60% houses damage 

20% animals lost 

60% said it will take at least one to 

two years and PKR.100000= USD 

1100= 8000 SEK is not enough for 

start a life. 

40% said it takes two years and 

PKR.100000= USD 1100= 8000 

SEK is good compensation if 

governments provide it to us as 

soon as possible. 

90% said yes if government 

provides funds then we go and start 

our lives. 

10% said yes but we are more 

interested to start our life in city and 

find work here 

70% said yes because we have no 

properly good drinking water and 

flood water is standing and causing 

malaria, stomach problems. 

30% said no, we didn’t face any 

problem but sometimes we have flu 

due to malaria. 

70% said no, they working very 

slowly and still we didn’t get 

properly fund. 

30% said yes, we get fund from 

government and Ngo´s and aid 

agencies but we need enough aid 

to start our lives. 

05% have 10-25 Acre 


03-06 Buffalo 

07-10 Goat 

02-04 cows 

80% said problem of food stuff, 

medicine, winter clothes and lack of 

money. 

20% said lack of money because 

they are getting food and other stuff 

from government aid agencies and 

other resources. 

Rural Area 

05% knew one week in advance 



60% came to know when the flood 

was on the doorstep because of the 

lack of information and lack of 

literacy 

40% didn’t know 

30% by relatives, friends and 

landlord/feudals. 

25% Radio 

05% Ngo´s 

02% lost family member out of total 

at study area Sindh. 

90% lost crops out of total 

agriculture land 

95% houses are partially and fully 

damages out of total 

80% animals lost/died out of total 

85% said it takes at least one year 

and PKR.100000= USD 1100= 

8000 SEK is very good 

compensation of to start live again. 

15% said it will take long time and 

we are interested to find work here 

in city. 

60% said yes if government 

provides funds then we go and start 

our lives. 

40% said yes but we are more 

interested to start our life in city and 

find work here because we are 

afraid if we go and build our houses 

and again flood come then we have 

no option 

95% said yes, we have lot of 

problems and we didn’t get good 

drinking water and flood water is 

standing and causing malaria, 

stomach problems 

05% no, we didn’t face any 

problem. 

95% said no, they working very 

slowly and still we didn’t get 

properly fund or Watan card money 

which is Rs.100000=8000 SEK. 

05% said yes, we get fund from 

government and Ngo´s and aid 

agencies but we need enough aid 

to start our lives. 



85% farm workers 

06-10 Buffalo 

15-25 Goat 

03-07 cows 

95% said problem of food stuff, 

medicine, winter cloths and lack of 

money. 

05% said lack of money because 

they are getting food and other stuff 

from government aid agencies and 

other resources. 

II


C. Questionnaire response from the aid agencies personals 

Questions 

Response 

Q# 1.Did you get any threat while in 

the process of rehabilitation? 

Yes! We were getting threats from local people during the distribution 

of funds because they are hungry and many people snatching the 

food, medicine and clothes .So, for our safety governments provide 

us security. 

Q#2. What kind of major problems are 

people facing in your perspective? 

There are many problems that the affected people are facing ,for 

example shortage of food, drinking water and also health issues as 

there are people who are facing water born diseases 

Q#3. What do you think how long time 

the rehabilitation process will take so 

that flood victims go back to their pre 

flood normal life? 

It will take at least one or two years because flood victims have 

nothing as compared to pre flood situation. The government is 

providing funds, so gradually they will move to their places and start 

their lives as soon they get the relief goods 

Q#4. How much support do you get 

from the government, and civil 

society? 

Q#5. How do you participate in the 

rehabilitation process? 

We have been partially supported by government. 

Provision of aid to the flood victims, which generally we get mainly 

from general public by running campaigns about the flood, however 

media support is also important in our fund raising. 

D. Questionnaire response from the NGOs 

Questions 

Response 

Q#1. How do you see this flood? 

Q#2. As a neutral person, what do you think 

how much people have lost financially and what 

kind of risk are they facing now? 

This is a big disaster in Pakistan and millions of people are 

affected by this flood 

Millions of houses are demolish, crops are destroyed by 

flood, animals either lost or killed and loss of human life. 

There is big risk of many water borne diseases and people 

are sick and hungry 

Q#3. Do you think victims are properly cared by 

the aid agencies and government? 

Government agencies provide the aid and there are many 

NGOs and political parties for example Muttahida Quami 

movement (Pakistan), they are providing fund, government 

is also issuing Watan card to all victims, but there are many 

victims who didn’t get any fund from government. 

Q#4. What is the role of NGO´S in the 

rehabilitations of the victims? 

Q#5. In your opinion how long time it will take to 

complete rehabilitation of the flood victims? 

Q#6. Is the relief compensation fairly 

distributed? 

NGOS´s are providing food, clothes and house hold stuff 

and money for victims of flood by the collaboration of 

general public and political parties. 

It will take at least one year more because flood victims 

have lost almost everything e.g. house, crop land, livestock 

and their jobs. 

No! Because most of the flood victims are still waiting to get 

any sort of aid to re-build their life. 

Q#7. What kind of problems do you see among 

flood victims? 

People are hungry for food, lacking of good clothes to 

protect from winter. Apart from this, many people are at risk 

of water borne diseases and there is need of doctors as 

well to provide necessary health support to flood victims 

III


E. Questionnaire response from Policy makers 

Questions 

Response 

Q# 1.Did you inform or tried to inform people before 

flood to move to safer places? 

Q# 2.What is the minimum or maximum lose of 

people? Any record? 

Q# 3.What do you think that how it will be possible 

to bring back the flood victims to their normal life? 

Q# 4 Is government or aid agencies working in 

proper way for the cause? 

Q# 5.What is the major problem in relief and 

rehabilitation process? 

Q# 6.What lesson have you learned from current 

flood? 

Q #7.What kinds of water borne diseases are 

expected to spread among the flood victims? 

Q# 8.Are there enough doctors and medicines to 

save the lives of flood victims? 

Q# 9.In what ways aid agencies and government is 

helping flood victims? 

Q# 10.Are there any specific problem which needs 

urgent sort of treatment or attentions? 

Yes, we informed the people about update of flood 

through government resources and media but in 

some rural area where electricity and other media 

sources are not available they did not get flood 

warnings on time. 

More than 2000 people are died and millions of 

houses are demolished. Similarly about 

1,400,000 acres of cropland was damaged. In fact 

the whole socio-economic profile is severely 

damaged in Sindh province of Pakistan. Record is 

available at NDMA website. 

It will take time because the country has never faced 

such kind flooding situation before. The government 

is trying hard to fully compensate the people so that 

they could restart their normal life as they had before 

the flood. 

Yes, government and aid agencies are trying their 

best to compensate every flood victim. Apart of this 

the government is also getting some fund from 

foreign countries to meet the requirements of the 

flood victims. 

Actually people are frustrated as they have big 

families, bad weather and bad condition of living 

which have made the situation worst. That’s why in 

some areas some people have tried to snatch the 

relief goods and threaten the NGO or relief workers. 

Flood warning system needs improvement, Disaster 

response program should be initiated in people and 

at administration level. 

Skin disease/ problem, Diarrhea, Typhoid , Giardia, 

Salmonella, Cholera, , E. Coli and Fecal Coli etc 

Yes, there are doctors and other medical staff but still 

there is a shortage of medicines and doctors, which 

is the main hurdle in treatment of flood victims 

Aid agencies providing relief good to some extent, 

which includes food/ tents/ drinking stuffs but the aid 

need to be consistent rather periodic. 

Yes, there are pregnant women and in fact newly 

born babies as well which need special treatment 

IV

Floods and Rehabilitation Process - Mark- och vattenteknik

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