he floods may have passed but the people of Sindh and Balochistan continue to struggle to secure food rations, clothing and shelter. It has been a month now. The government as well as the voluntary organisations have yet to initiate rehabilitation measures for the affected population. I have reported from Lasbela, Naseerabad and Jaffarabad districts of Balochistan. The visuals still haunt me. A large number of people are forced to live in the open with whatever assets they have in their possession. During a visit to Dera Murad Jamali in mid-August, we were travelling along the Putt Feeder canal. Majhoshoori, Mirwah and Tamboo areas had been inundated. Carcasses of dead cattle floated in the water. People drank from the same water without a thought because there was no other option.

We saw many people trying hard to get back to their feet again. Some of them wished to work in the fields but those were still under water. Zaheer Baloch, a university student, was one of them. He has lost several acres of irrigated land in Mirwah tehsil in Naseerabad district. He has also lost cattle, a house and other property. In August, he had complained that the government was nowhere to be seen helping with relief. Asked about the rehabilitation process, more recently, he said: “There is nothing happening. During the 2010 and 2012 floods, some NGOs had helped people not only with money but also in the rehabilitation work. Now, our houses, our fields and our assets are all gone. There is nothing I can sell to get back on my feet… I have nothing left to sell.” For several weeks now, he and other villagers in Naseerabad have been trying to secure funds to start rehabilitation work for the flood-affected.

The scale of the devastation has been so large that the already marginalised people, like small farmers, will need a lifetime to get back to their feet.

Tahir Umrani has lost almost everything in the floods. He is currently living at a cousin’s house in Dera Murad Jamali. “My crops have been destroyed; my home is a ruin and my cattle are gone. I cannot go to my village now. My parents, too, are here staying at my cousin’s house.”

Tehsil Chattar of Naseerabad is one of the places affected first by rain and later the failure of the administration to acknowledge that it needed relief and rehabilitation. Roads have been destroyed, several bridges have been damaged and communication channels have been rendered dysfunctional.

Qadir Naseeb, a volunteer, has been visiting Dera Murad Jamali every day to distribute medicines among the people of Chattar. He found the displaced people living under the open sky with little food and no medicines. Qadir has accused the government of turning his people into beggars. “We don’t want food rations and clothes. We want our homes. We want roads so that we can go to places and buy whatever we need.”

In Lasbela, the affected people have started settling down. The worst of flash floods in Lasbela occurred in mid-July after incessant rains turned the Porali and Kharrari streams into mighty rivers. The Porali River inundated Oraki, Harra and some villages of Lakhra in Lasbela. These areas remained inaccessible for several weeks. There was up to four feet of stagnant water. The displaced people were temporarily settled at Wayara, Tiyaro, Sukkan and Uthal where they had to wait for hours for minimal rations.

A resident of Oraki was eager to return to his house. He insisted that the authorities leave him where his mother had died, where his crops had been submerged and where his cattle were washed away. “They (authorities) are humiliating us,” he lamented. “They are asking me for an identity card to get ration. How can I be expected to carry an identity card during such floods?”

It would take years for life to return to normal in Jaffarabad. Gandakha, Chowki Jamali and adjacent villages, are the worst affected in Jaffarabad.

Winter is round the corner and the residents of Naseerabad, Lasbela and Jaffarabad face more misery. The government is seen making some effort to provide relief but is not focusing on rehabilitation. The authorities seem to have ignored the fact that while people might manage to live in the open during summer, shelter will be an absolute necessity in winter. Most non-government organisations are not equipped for the task. It may take years before people are able to pick up from where they left when the floods devastated their lives.

The writer is a journalist associated with Geo News. He is an MPhil scholar with specialisation in political narrative, theory and nationalism. He tweets at @waqasaalam