Badin Parish Flood Update

By Fr. Pat Viscanti

Since the damaging floods last monsoon season, the villages that were affected here in Badin parish have recovered remarkably well. My last visitation to Tajeli village, one of the badly flooded villages in our parish about a week ago was very satisfactory to see that the villages have moved on and rebuilding themselves. Although there are a lot or rehabilitation work that’s pending, the villages are back working in the fields preparing it for the planting of the next crop. A lot of them are getting work with the rice harvesting season on now. It was very fortunate that a lot of the rice fields close by survived the flooding so many of our people are able to get some income for themselves. 

Almost all of the villages that were affected in the parish are back to their normal routine except a very few that still live in the makeshift grass houses on the road side. This brings to light the need for proper housing for many of our people in the parish. Housing is an issue because many of our people are living on land own by Landlords thus, they cannot build concrete or permanent houses. Unfortunately, it’s a challenge that is beyond our control unless something is done like purchasing of land, or relocate families to Church own land and rebuild there. 

In Badin, we are very fortunate to have received overwhelming support from Columbans, Columban supporters and Pakistanis here and abroad especially from England. The Dioses and Caritas were among the first responders and distributed generously.  St Joseph Convent School in Karachi run by the Daughters of the Cross Sisters have donated food rations, clothes and shoes. Divine Hope, a Charity organization run by Daniel Bashir and a group of youths from Karachi distributed 80 packages of food ration. They also conducted some medical and Hygiene awareness during the distribution as there were medical professionals that were part of their group which was very good. 

Reaching out to us here as well was Rev Deacon Stephen Khokhar and his Pakistani parishioners from England. This was made possible through our school principal Emmanual Lal. With the generosity of friends, donors and benefactors, it has enabled us to reach out to as many affected families as we can, with some receiving more than ones. So far, we have distributed 490 packages to 280 families and we have planned another distribution and we hope to distribute it to 60 families. With that, we thank you our generous benefactors for continuing to support us, helping us in our efforts to reach out to our affected people as much as possible.