As news channels flashed images of swollen rivers round the clock, a young Zubair Hajjano appeared calm, tending to his cattle in the Indus riverine area, colloquially known as the ‘katcha’.
His livestock grazing at a distance inside the main dyke of the river was his only concern. The main dyke that covers a certain mileage of Hyderabad and Matiari districts is located downstream of Sukkur and the area here provides ample land for crops as well as grazing grounds for cattle. “Pani aaye ga tu dekhey gey (We will worry once the floodwater arrives),” Zubair said smilingly when asked if he had an idea about when floodwaters from the Sukkur barrage would reach the katcha area. He looked somewhat uninterested in talking about the anticipated flood, unlike other members from his community.
At a distance, a separate group of Hajjano men were sitting underneath an acacia tree before returning to their village located across Ghalyan Bund — a 13-mile-long dyke starting from Matiari to the Jamshoro front bund. Acacia trees are a common sight in Sindh’s katcha area on both sides of the river within its two dykes, whose construction began by the British when they started building Sukkur in 1930s.
Unlike Zubair, Sajjad and Zaheer were a bit more cautious, whom I met about 1km beyond the main dyke. Amid all the hullabaloo about super floods, they were making their own assessments about the incoming deluge daily. Their quest to predict the floods was guided by indigenous knowledge.
Unruffled Indus riverine area dwellers rely on indigenous methods to prepare for deluge
“Water gradually rises on a daily basis when floodwaters enter the area,” Sajjad explained. He pointed towards a manmade bank of a drain, called Chandhan, that brings effluent from Matiari located on the left bank of the Indus downstream of Sukkur. The drain’s outfall is inside the riverine area, touching the Ghalyan Bund in the Hyderabad district.
“When flows increased last month, the water had touched this drain’s bund…before it receded, leaving its mark behind,” he recalled, alluding to a brief high flood of 510,798 cusecs in Guddu downstream on Aug 24’s afternoon. The barrage attained a medium flood level of 477,864 cusecs at 6pm the same day.
“I check a certain stone or a piece of wood to see whether it is soaked or drowned. If the surface shows some dried surface, then it means the levels are still lower than expected. The next morning, I repeat the exercise again…” a complacent Zaheer added.
“For our communities, different landmarks serve as determinants of floods’ arrival,” said Chakar Chalgari, an irrigation department employee. Ahmed Ali Chalgari, another resident, agrees with him. “The month of August is a harbinger of floods for us. We do maintain benchmarks inside the area. For instance, I will keep checking some plants like devi — wild vegetation — in the area to have an idea of increasing river flows”.
The Hajjano community lives in the Bodhani village across Ghalyan Bund, feeding off the riverine land. Many of them own small pieces of land for agricultural purposes, while others work as peasants managing the lands of influential landlords. These large tracts of land are, by and large, owned by those having political connections or government backing, and they either have direct land ownership or have occupied massive forestlands. Successive orders by the Sindh High Court a couple of years back led to the retrieval of encroached forest land and entry in revenue record.
Katcha economy
The katcha area — infamous for its bandits — is actually the region’s breadbasket due to its rich soil. Various streams flow from the Indus to water these farmlands, with several protected by private embankments. Landowners build these private bunds, called zamindari bund, around their lands to protect them against floods, but if the Indus has very high or super floods, like in 2010, these are washed away.
The riverine area contributes to the country’s food security to a great degree, producing grain and other crops. Kharif crops, like cotton, and winter crops like wheat, pulses, gram and vegetables, are grown here besides the large-scale sugarcane cultivation. A previous visit in 2021 revealed a mindboggling scale of cane cultivation inside the katcha area.
A Board of Revenue document showed that Sindh’s katcha land and river island spanned an area of 977,527 acres (3,697 square kms); 3pc of Sindh’s total land i.e. 34,820,640 acres (140,914 sq kms).
Katcha dwellers pay 50pc of dhal (revenue charges) when compared with their settled area farmers. Abiyana (water charges) are not recoverable from them, as they are not dependent on regular irrigation supplies.
“Output from the katcha area is part of the overall production of grain and other crops in Sindh,” informed Agriculture Extension DG Munir Jumani. He said the recent flooding downstream of Guddu and Sukkur, however, damaged sugarcane, cotton and vegetables.
For the locals, if inundation becomes evident, then they move out with their livestock and wait for the water to recede.
In the 2010 floods, water flows had hit this dyke. In July of that year, officials had not expected floodwaters would inundate gauges — usually installed along every river dyke to record historic flows — at the Ghalyan dyke. This super flood still haunts the dwellers.
Wahid Magsi, who actually hails from Jhalg Magsi, said it was water everywhere, forcing them to settle atop this embankment. These floods proved to be the most destructive for Sindh, displacing millions and washing away hundreds of cattle heads.
Published in Dawn, September 8th, 2025
