IT rained heavily in 2020. And now it is 2025. The rains have once again devastated Karachi. We have witnessed flooded streets, huge traffic jams, students, working-class employees, motorcyclists and other commuters unable to reach their homes in a paralysed city.
Karachi’s people are willing to help marooned citizens in any way they can. Given the time that has elapsed between 2020 and 2025, the Karachi public is angry and is asking a relevant question: what have Karachi agencies done in the last five years to tackle flooding and related issues in the city? The answer is — nothing. The agencies respond that precipitation patterns have changed and because of that it is not possible to predict how the rain system for Karachi will evolve. They also point out that other South Asian cities, like Mumbai, face problems similar to those of Karachi.
Over the past few years, the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) and local agencies have tried to tackle Karachi’s drainage problems. In 2021, a survey by NED University, tasked with conducting a study of Karachi’s settlements, identified three Karachi nullahs that needed to be cleared of encroachments to facilitate the flow of water. Professionals, NGOs and ‘experts’ objected to the survey because they considered it to be one of ‘properties’ and not of people or households. As a result of the survey, about 7,500 families were removed from around the Orangi, Mehmoodabad and Gujjar nullahs so that Karachi would not flood. Their houses were bulldozed and they became homeless. The Supreme Court, while permitting the demolition, ordered the rehabilitation of those affected.
There has been much agitation by civil society against the ‘cruelty’ that the process has generated, and Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari promised that the affected population would be rehabilitated. Recently, the Sindh High Court ordered that, in compliance with Supreme Court directives, the evicted population be rehoused, with funds allocated by the Sindh government. However, not much work has been done to implement judicial orders.
As has been pointed out by my colleagues and myself several times, one of the major drainage problems that the city faces is that its outfalls to the sea are blocked for the most part, and even where they are not, the gates to the outfalls do not function. A detailed study of the Mehmoodabad nullah was carried out by the Technical Training Resource Centre (TTRC), an Orangi-based organisation. The study discovered that the majority of gates which feed the outfalls to the Gizri Creek were inoperable, thus preventing more than 70 per cent of effluent from reaching the outfalls and leading to the flooding of large areas in DHA Phase IV and VII.
What have Karachi agencies done to tackle urban flooding.
The other interesting fact the study revealed was that the Mehmoodabad nullah was served by 34 smaller nullahs, which flowed into it in its journey to the Gizri Creek. These sub-nullahs are also blocked by garbage and debris and stop rainwater from flowing into the main nullah, causing floods in the settlements they pass through. Unless they are desilted and maintained, the Mehmoodabad nullah cannot function to its full capacity. There is, except for the TTRC study, no mapping of the 34 sub-nullahs or the Mehmoodabad outfall to the sea.
The desilting carried out by the NDMA and local government agencies did not even reduce flooding, let alone arrest it. The desilting and construction of the reinforced concrete retaining walls are incomplete to this day.
So one thing is clear: that removing low-income settlements alone will not solve Karachi’s drainage problems. There are also middle-class and elite houses that are stopping the flow of floodwaters. Maybe, a study of removing should also be considered.
But there are other problems as well. This relates to the estate developers’ greed for land and their control over the land market and the government agencies which help them operate it. For example, the Orangi nullah has roads on either side of it and these have been increased to nine metres in width, although only 3.5 metres are required. Given the location of the Orangi nullah from the Lyari Expressway to the RCD highway, this is an ideal place for real estate development, which will surely take place, creating further flooding across Karachi and increasing traffic problems.
If a solution to Karachi’s drainage-related issues and problems is required then all the points discussed above will have to be taken into consideration. It has to be understood that without efficient institutional arrangements these issues cannot be resolved.
The writer is an architect.
arifhasan37@gmail.com
www.arifhasan.org
Published in Dawn, August 30th, 2025