Floods devastate Pakistan’s Punjab, 600,000 displaced, 15 dead

LAHORE, Torrential monsoon rains and water released from India have unleashed catastrophic floods across Pakistan’s Punjab province, killing at least 15 people and displacing more than 600,000, authorities said Thursday.

Floodwaters from the Sutlej, Ravi and Chenab rivers breached embankments and swept through villages, submerging vast areas of farmland. Officials said hundreds of thousands of acres of cotton, rice and other crops have been destroyed, dealing a heavy blow to the agricultural heartland.

“Seven deaths were reported in Gujranwala division alone,” Commissioner Naveed Haider Shirazi told reporters, while additional fatalities were confirmed in Gujrat, Sambrial, Narowal and Gujranwala city.

In Bahawalpur and Vehari districts, embankments gave way under surging waters, leaving dozens of settlements under water. In Sargodha, authorities braced for a peak flow of one million cusecs in the Chenab River later Thursday, even as 2,500 people and 1,700 livestock were moved to safety.

On the Ravi River, water levels at Head Balloki continued to rise, while rescue workers evacuated at least 30 people. Further south in Sindh’s Naushahro Feroze district, a breach in the Indus River inundated five villages and submerged crops.

Officials warn that riverbank erosion and rising water levels could worsen the devastation in the coming days.