KARACHI: Once upon a time, the Sindhu River, flowed triumphantly into the Arabian Sea, regal, majestic, bragging of the beauty of the alluvial lands it left on its pathway. Today, thanks to lack of rains, and the construction of barrages and dams from Punjab to Sindh, its appearance at the Thatta-Sajawal bridge, seems to be only a wide strip of left over rain water.

It is the several contributing factors at stake that have changed this river into a sorry sight.

Rains for instance are what Pakistan needs the most, especially being an agricultural state. The Indus River too, apart from being fed by glaciers, depends upon rains, so that the summer monsoons and the Western Depressions can give it back any water lost in the middle.

Even though the land of Punjab manages to survive because of high annual rainfall, the Indus in Punjab and its tributaries have become scantier than before.

But Sindh undoubtedly suffers more.

It does not have enough rainfall, as it once used to and the river does not have enough water. Specifically it is the delta lands that have suffered more than any other place in Sindh over time. Over the past decade, more changes have come in the delta area of Sindh, than any other place, because of the changes in the River Indus.

Indus, which divides into several small tributaries at the mouth of the Arabian Sea, after a journey of about 3000 km, has now visibly retreated. The delta which is the fifth largest in the world, with about 17 creeks, covers a fan shaped area of about three million hectares. Presently, however the active Indus delta occupies an area of approximately 600,000 hectares with its apex to the south of Thatta. In all, it extends from Karachi to the Rann of Kutch. The delta forms a consistent alluvial plain with large extensive mud flats intervened by narrow creeks, which are remnants of old Indus tributaries.

But the delta lands that used to be wealthy in fertile soil and where villagers thrived by catching fish, are now dying a slow and horrible death. It has been deprived of the freshwater that nurtured its rich mangrove forests, fisheries, paddy rice and orchards.

In the past, there has been a silt discharge of over 400 million tons per year. The silt brought by the river now has largely diminished because the force of the river has also reduced. Due to the construction of dams and barrages and extensive engineering works upstream, the quantity of water and silt reaching the delta has drastically reduced, causing rapid reworking and transgression of the Indus delta. Both the river and the delta are threatened by the myopic policies of successive rulers and the building of barrages and large dams upstream.

The delta has throughout time also been ideal for agriculture. It was considered as a major red rice, sugarcane and banana source.

“In the 1930s there was so much red rice being produced here, that land owners used to give half of their rice away to the peasants working on their land,” says a villager of Keti Bunder. “Keti Bunder was a very large port in those times.” 

Other crops that used to be produced in large amounts were wheat, barley, gram, oil seeds, rice, maize, millet, cotton, and jowar. Fruits included the date palm, coconut, mango, fig, pomegranate, apple, peach, melon, banana, guava and papaya. But villagers say that the land has become so dry and barren now, that only a few crops survive in the intense heat. Of course this has also led to migration of people, leaving only empty villages behind them.

Speaking of better times, Shahid Baloch, who lives in a nearby village, says that he learnt from his elders that bananas were first planted in this area in 1928, before they spread out to the rest of the sub continent. They were of the Mumbai variety, he says.

“Believe it or not there used to be a forest in Keti Bunder,” he says. “That too has been wiped out because of the retreating Sindhu River.”

As a result of land infertility, there are only two tehsils that are inhabited. The rest are dead. These two are Keti Bunder and Khaaro Chaan. And these too, survive with extreme difficulty, especially since there is little drinking water available.