Daily Times

KARACHI: Rehmat Dablo, resident of a small fishermen hamlet located on the one the deltaic islands in vast scattered delta of River Indus, was busy cutting branches of mangroves, so that he may feed his camels, the only livestock on the remote island.

“Freshwater of River Indus is no more reaching to this part of the delta, therefore we have no any plant or vegetation, except mangroves,” said Dablo.

The village, comprising on few makeshift huts, constructed on raised mud platform, as every day during high tide, almost every part of the island submerges with seawater.

The island is located on the edges of Turchan creek, one of the 17 major and countless minor creeks of River Indus.

Dablo recalls the past and said that once mighty River Indus was flowing in these creeks with full swing and people used to grow several major crops like famous red rice of this region, sugarcane, wheat and bananas. Due to presence of abundant amount of freshwater, people were keeping livestock such as cow, buffalo and horses as well as camel.

“But now there is no water for human and we have to transport water from Keti Bunder town, the last human settlement on River Indus, which is around 2 hours away on boat,” said Dablo.

But despite that the villagers have kept dogs and camels for which they pay huge money on water transportation. “We are mostly fishermen and we go for fishing for many days and in the village only women and children left, so dogs are guarding the village in our absence,” said Dablo.

The villagers also keep unique breed of camels is known as Kharai camel, famous in Pakistan and India for its ability to swim in seawater. “Also these camels eat mangrove leaves and we don’t need to bring fodder or grass from outside the delta,” Dalbo added.

Due to the acute water shortage in the creeks of River Indus delta, due to upstream diversion of river water, construction of dams and barrages, people living on these islands are now moving to other areas. Sea level rise as a result of climate change has accelerated the rate of migration. Environmentalists term them as ‘Climate Migrants’ and Global Climate Risk Index 2017 has ranked Pakistan ‘seventh among the most adversely affected countries by climate change’.

Once fifth and now ranked as the 7th largest Delta in the world, the River Indus Delta spreads over 600,000 haters with 240 kilometers in length. According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) till 2003, the total population of Indus delta was around 900,000 but Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum (PFF), claims that half of its population has now shifted to other districts of Pakistan due to water shortage and sea level rise.

Published in Daily Times, March 18^th 2018.