Karachi: Heavy monsoon rains have wreaked
havoc in Sindh province and other parts of Pakistan, claiming
over 60 lives, sweeping away villages and crops and rendering
thousands of people homeless.
Torrential rains have battered lower and upper Sindh and
south Punjab and have kept central and upper Punjab on edge
for the past four days as flash floods have also been reported
across eastern Balochistan.
The monsoon rains and thunderstorms have brought untold
misery to the interior areas of Sindh province where many
villages with their mud houses were swept away, crops
destroyed and livestock killed.
A top government official said that rescue and relief
committees had been formed in every district of the province
to carry out relief operations and the government had also
announced a Rs 20,000 grant for each affected family.
"The government has allocated special funds to provide
relief and help the affected people and families," he said.
Reports have also said that trucks carrying relief goods
were looted and angry and frustrated people had blocked roads
in lower Sindh.
Federal Minister for Water and Power Syed Navid Qamar said
they had reports of 60 people being killed in the rains and
floods in lower Sindh and thousands of acres of crops being
devastated.
"The rains and flash floods have swept away katcha houses
and villages and left devastated vast swathes of crops in some
districts besides loss of livestock and collapse of thousands
of katcha houses," he said.
Eight deaths were reported yesterday as heavy rains
continued to lash Nawabshah, Dadu, Matiari, Sanghar,
Mirpurkhas, Tando Allahyar, Naushehro Feroze, Badin, Umerkot
and Tando Muhammad Khan districts.
Badin, one of the worst-hit districts, witnessed looting
of trucks carrying relief goods.
Six women were injured when the police resorted to baton
charge to disperse the crowd.
Separately, the National Highway was blocked by enraged
locals for several hours in Nawabshah district.
Although the agricultural department has not issued the
details of crop losses but it is believed that rains have
destroyed cotton crop sown over 1 million acres in the 13 rain
affected districts of lower Sindh.
Qamar said some 30,000 villages in Badin had been
evacuated by the Army as the met department forecast 3 more
days of heavy rainfall in Hyderabad and Mirpurkhas divisions.
Tahir Munir, the chief of Balochistan`s disaster
management authority said torrential rains had left nine
people dead across the province.
PTI
