e do not send our children to schools and madrassahs when clouds gather in the sky,” says 48-year-old Muhammad Sagheer, a daily wager from Buner’s Beshonai village. He remembers the day he lost 17 members of his family, including a daughter. “All hell broke loose that day. We cannot bear to witness something like that again.”

Sagheer is one of the people suing for compensation for the lives lost and the damage to property.

Last year, more than 500 people lost their lives in rains and flooding in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The catastrophe, widely attributed to climate change, also destroyed infrastructure.

Buner was the worst affected district, followed by Shangla, Swabi, Chitral, Kohistan and Mansehra.

Locals say they had to rebuild roads, mini power stations, foot paths and suspension bridges on a self-help basis.

Sagheer’s village was among the worst hit; 86 of the residents died in the floods.

He says the disaster changed their lives and left them highly vulnerable. Sagheer says they are still struggling to find a safe drinking water source. Rehabilitation of pedestrian paths and bridges, too, is far from complete.

“Immediately after the floods, there was much attention paid to the area,” he says. Sagheer says the locals would see representatives of the media, government officials and non-government organisations in the area.

Gradually, that changed.

“It seems that they have forgotten us.”

Zahoor Khan, an activist in Beshonai, says that the villagers cannot forget the destruction caused by the floods. “They live in fear of floods,” he says adding that some of the villagers had suffered intense psychological issues in the aftermath of the disaster.

Khan says some NGOs and philanthropists have helped rebuild houses of the affected people. Access to safe drinking water, however, remains a challenge.

He says 20-25 families had migrated to other villages that were considered safer.

Khan says they are still waiting for government’s assistance to repair roads, water supply schemes and suspension bridges, and to provide safe pedestrian paths for school children.

In Shangla, 36 people lost their lives in the August 2025 floods that were triggered by a cloudburst in the area. Local infrastructure, including schools, roads, bridges, irrigation channels and pedestrian tracks were washed away in the floods. They have yet to be rebuilt.

Ayub Khan, a resident of Ismail Khel union council in Puran, Shangla, tells The News on Sunday that the Hilal Shaheed-Loya Dara main road around five kilometres long, and the Damazy-Landai Dara road, about two kilometres long, were damaged by the floods.

“The district administration deployed excavators to restore roads for the passage of light traffic. They never returned to ask the people about their problems,” says Jamaat-i-Islami’s local leader Dayan Ghafar.

He says several bridges and suspension bridges were also washed away or damaged. Those included the Hilal Shaheed Suspension Bridge, Damazy Bridge, Shati Dara Main Suspension Bridge, Tagha Paty Bridge, Loya Dara Bridge and Karorai Bridge. The Damazy and Loya Dara causeways were also affected.

Khan says all electricity poles in Loya Dara and Landai Dara were washed away. He says several educational institutions were also destroyed. He says life had come to a standstill in both villages. 60 percent of the population, he says, still lacks access to electricity.

Dayan Ghafar, a Jamaat-i-Islami leader, says the government had ‘abandoned’ the flood-affected areas of Chagam, Khwar Banda, Gombat and Shati Dara, where people still faced rehabilitation challenges.

“The district administration deployed excavators to restore roads for the passage of light traffic. They never returned to ask the people about their problems,” he says.

The JI leader claims that the government has done nothing for the rehabilitation of the area. He says that students were forced to study in the open or in tents provided by some NGOs.

The situation in Kohistan is not much better.

Roads and bridges washed away in the 2022 floods have yet to be rehabilitated, putting inhabitants in distress and creating daily challenges for them.

Javed Khan, a school teacher, says he walks for hours along the river and through the mountains to reach his school every day. He says 90 percent of suspension bridges, roads and pedestrian paths were being built by locals on a self-help basis, with one person from each household volunteering to rehabilitate these every day.

According to local journalist Juma Shah Jalali, five people, including two girls, have drowned in the Dubair River while travelling to hospitals, visiting relatives or going to markets in Ranolia.

He says the 32-kilometre Dubair Road, located between two mountains, has been due for maintenance for several years.

In Upper Kohistan’s Kandia Valley, the crucial Karang Bridge was washed away following a cloudburst, disconnecting the area from the rest of the country.

Hafeez-ur-Rehman, a local, says that the Karang Bridge has been rebuilt with Rs 600,000 collected from the community. He says mini power stations and water mills were also constructed through community efforts.

He says the locals avoid going to markets, hospitals and schools, when the government issues an alert.

“We have seen disastrous floods that caused much loss of life and property. We want protection and awareness in rural areas.”

Hafeez urges the government to ensure functional early warning systems, and stronger measures to save lives and property.

Abdul Munim, an MPA from Shangla (PK-29), tells TNS that he has been pursuing the case of the flood affected. He hopes that rehabilitation work will begin soon. He says Shangla and Buner will receive funds for rehabilitation, particularly for the restoration of schools.

The writer covers human rights, climate change and governance in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Gilgit-Baltistan. He can be reached at @umar_shangla1.