For Shama, a mother of four in Punjab’s Kasur district, this August brought a cruel déjà vu. Earlier this year, cross-border clashes between India and Pakistan forced her family to abandon their home. Now, as floodwaters from rivers swelling across the border surge into her village, she once again gathers her children and prepares to evacuate.

“How many times do we have to leave our homes?” Shama asked, her husband navigating their 10 cows to higher ground by boat. “First war, now water. Trouble comes in every form.”

Her experience is shared by dozens of families across the flood-hit region, who are struggling with repeated displacements in a matter of months.

Life on the Edge: Living Between War and Water

In Kasur, a town just kilometers from the Indian border, residents are all too familiar with dual threats. “The floods began early this month and kept worsening,” said Bibi Zubaida, 27, who lives with seven relatives in a three-bedroom house opposite a mosque. Loudspeakers that usually call worshippers to prayer instead announced evacuation efforts, urging people to board boats to safety.

“When you live here, you accept that danger is part of everyday life—whether from the border or the river,” Zubaida said.

From rooftops and rescue boats, villagers reported seeing Indian checkposts on the horizon—a constant reminder of the geopolitical pressures shaping their lives.

Rivers Once Managed, Now Unpredictable

The Indus Waters Treaty, a 60-year-old agreement regulating shared rivers between India and Pakistan, has traditionally helped prevent catastrophic flooding. But earlier this year, India suspended the treaty following a deadly attack that it blamed on Pakistan, triggering a brief but intense flare-up along the border.

Then came the monsoon, and the rivers turned into torrents.

Rescue teams from Pakistan’s 1122 service have been working around the clock to ferry families out of inundated villages. Narrow wooden boats are packed with children, belongings, motorcycles, and even livestock, as villagers navigate fields submerged beneath fast-moving water.

“People often hesitate to leave because they fear looting or losing their animals,” said rescue worker Muhammad Arsalan. “Many refuse to leave without their goats and sheep.” In recent days, Arsalan has helped evacuate over 1,500 people.

Rising Toll and Growing Worries

So far, the floods have claimed at least 30 lives in Punjab, with waters spreading southward and threatening new areas. Across the border in India, sudden cloudbursts in the Ramban and Mahore regions of Jammu and Kashmir killed 10 people.

Officials in Pakistan blame the crisis on the suspension of the Indus Waters Treaty, arguing that better coordination could have mitigated the impact. “If the treaty had been in operation, we could have managed the flooding more effectively,” Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal told Reuters.

Farmers are facing devastating losses. Muhammad Amjad, a rice and vegetable grower, said 13 of his 15 acres have been submerged. “Women and children are evacuated first. Men stay behind to protect what remains,” he said.

The Human Cost of Border Vulnerability

The back-to-back crises of conflict and flooding highlight the precarious lives of communities along Pakistan’s eastern border. For many, the mounting threats underscore an unsettling reality: climate change is intensifying monsoon rains, while political tensions over shared rivers complicate disaster response.

“I’ve seen floods in 1988, 2023, and now this one,” said Nawabuddin, a 74-year-old landowner. “But they’re coming more often now.”

Zubaida, surveying her submerged home and farmland, captured the sentiment of many residents: “We don’t want war. We don’t want excess water. We just want to live in peace.”