Two-thirds of Pakistan was submerged under water. Water that swelled, broke embankments and swept entire villages away. People were struggling with little to no access to food or any kind of shelter.
In line with our vision to provide relief and rehabilitation to people in distress, DawnRelief first initiated operations in villages in Balochistan that had been worst-hit by the floods and then expanded its relief operations to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Sindh.
We worked round-the-clock, distributing relief goods (including tents, essential food, soap, mosquito repellents and cooking utensils) in Lasbela District in southern Balochistan, which was among the worst affected by the floods.
We first focused on Uthal Tehsil, home to 21,979 men and women and 20,888 children (total population: 42,867). Before the floods struck, Uthal was a farming community scattered across several villages — and home to 7,912 families. The floods wiped everything out — entire houses, crops and livestock.
Then, we moved further north to Bela Tehsil, where 40,682 men and women and 39,442 children live (total population: 80,124 people) and where some 14,606 families were without shelter and food.
After Uthal and Bela, we directed our efforts to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, where in addition to the distribution of relief goods, we started the construction of a 350-foot cable trolley to replace a bridge that was destroyed during the floods. This will enable the people living along Mahandari Nullah to access neighbouring areas.
We also managed to expand our operations to southern Sindh with distribution drives in Goth Saleh Muhammad Bagul and Goth Suleman Kerai in Sujawal District and in the settlements of Bajara with its population of approximately 3,500 people, in the province’s Sehwan taluka.
As we wrap up critical relief operations in the flood-affected areas, we are now gearing up to rebuild devastated settlements with homes, schools and a drinking water supply scheme.
In Bajara, we have successfully completed the construction of 150 homes and have extended our efforts to Jhankara, a neighboring village, with an additional 50 homes now built. Our commitment to education has led to the reconstruction of a girls’ primary school in Bajara. Furthermore, we are on the verge of launching a drinking water supply scheme and initiating vocational training programs in the region. These initiatives are designed to empower local residents with essential skills, enabling them to take an active role in rebuilding and enhancing their communities.
With the majority of the 753 houses in the area destroyed and the number of households with access to clean drinking water dropping from 88 per cent to below 35pc, we hope to build one-fourth of the homes from our own resources and are actively looking for more donors to complete the target by next summer.
A simple donation of Rs200,000 per home will cover the cost of materials, cement fibre boards, angle irons and CGI metal sheets to create a 250-square-foot home to house up to nine people.
We aim to replicate these efforts across the country along the lines of our Home and School Reconstruction Programme which we previously implemented in Azad Kashmir, Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
DawnRelief, c/o Irfan ul Haq, DawnRelief, Haroon House, Dr Ziauddin Ahmed Road, Karachi 74500
Your generosity has enabled DawnRelief to successfully carry out relief efforts in parts of Balochistan, Sindh and KP.
Our special thanks to the following organisations for enabling us to carry these critical relief efforts:
• Amir Sultan Chinoy Foundation (ASCF)
• Ashary family
• Barkat Banaspati & Cooking Oil
• Cargill Pakistan
• CCL
• English Biscuit Manufacturers (EBM)
• Insights Driven Research (IDR)
• K-Electric (KE)
• Reckitt Pakistan
• Shezan International
• Shan Foods Pvt Ltd
•Tapal Tea Pvt Ltd
We continue to rely on your generosity to widen the scope of our relief efforts.
DawnRelief, officially known as the Dawn Relief Earthquake Welfare Organisation, was established in October 2005 by DawnMedia Pvt. Ltd., Pakistan’s leading news media group. The Group traces its history back to 1947, when Mr Mohammad Ali Jinnah founded Dawn newspaper in Karachi.
DawnRelief is registered under the Voluntary Social Welfare Agencies (Registration and Control) Ordinance 1961 as a non-political, non-sectarian, voluntary social welfare organisation.
The objectives of DawnRelief are to provide relief and rehabilitation to people affected by natural and man-made disasters in Pakistan and Azad Kashmir. The vision is to encourage affected communities to participate in a process of renewal conducive to establishing a sustainable leap in their quality of life.
In 2016, DawnRelief received the prestigious 2016: CSR Award by the National Forum for Environment & Health for its rehabilitation and reconstruction initiatives in Azad Kashmir and throughout Pakistan.
We have been rebuilding lives for over 15 years, and extended relief efforts to affected people across Pakistan.
2005
Immediately after the October 8, 2005 earthquake, DawnRelief set up four Tent Villages in Hattian Bala Tehsil in District Muzaffarabad (one of the areas most severely affected by the earthquake), and provided shelter to 8,500 men, women and children from 18 villages for nearly a year.
Since then, DawnRelief has been implementing an extensive rehabilitation, programme in Hattian Bala, and so far our home and school reconstruction programme has seen the completion of 166 prefabricated homes and seven schools.
On November 3, 2007, in recognition of the relief, rehabilitation and reconstruction work undertaken by DawnRelief in Hattian Bala, Azad Kashmir, the people of Karthama requested that their village be officially renamed Haroonabad. The name Haroonabad was chosen in recognition of the services of Haji Sir Abdullah Haroon during the Pakistan Movement and the creation of Pakistan, and to honour the media organisation founded by his heirs in furtherance of his mission.
The vision at DawnRelief is to bring a quantitative and qualitative change in the standard of living of the people in Hattian Bala by providing technical and material support that will reenergise the community and provide them with skills to take advantage of these emerging opportunities.
2008
In October 2008, when an earthquake struck Balochistan, DawnRelief provided aid and support to men, women and children located in the Kachch Fateh Khan, Momezam Killi, Kala Chaua and Torshor areas of Ziarat District, by trucking relief goods that included tents, bedding, blankets, dry food and jackets.
2009
In May 2009 in response to the unfolding humanitarian crisis caused by the displacement of hundreds of thousands of people from the Swat and the Malakand regions of North Pakistan, DawnRelief set up a camp in Labour Colony, Mardan, which provided 3,953 displaced people from Swat and Buner, with shelter, food and basic living amenities for nearly four months.
2010 & 2011
In August 2010, following deadly floods across Pakistan, DawnRelief set up relief camps in Nowshera, Hyderabad and Thatta, and provided over 22,000 people with food, water and shelter for six months. After that, DawnRelief began its Home Reconstruction Programme in Sindh, and handed over 250 newly constructed houses to displaced families there.
In August 2011, after another wave of deadly waves hit Lower Sindh, DawnRelief set up relief camps in Badin (in Sindh) that supported nearly 12,000 people from 27 villages in Sindh. After the flood waters subsided, DawnRelief began its Home Reconstruction Programme there, and established 435 homes, 2 functioning schools and over 130 community bath and washroom facilities in Badin, Sehwan and Thatta.
2015
In 2015, Chitral was hit by a 7.6 Richter scale earthquake on October 27, 2015. Since then, DawnRelief has been working in Churan Oveer, one of the hardest hit villages in the upper Chitral Valley.
The earthquake destroyed 143 houses there, and so far DawnRelief re-constructed 90 houses.
2020
In April 2020, following the lockdown imposed due to the Covid-19 pandemic, DawnRelief started to provide food rations to families living in katchi abadis in Baldia-Orangi Townships for three months; a population identified as Karachi’s poorest one percent.
We subsequently increased our scope significantly and in addition to supporting 3,916 families in Baldia-Orangi Townships, we extended our efforts to people living in Gharibabad who were made homeless due to the Karachi Circular Railway project, as well as to people living in Afghan Khaima Basti.
2021
In April 2021, we focused on 7,600 families who lived in 57 katchi abadis along Gujjar Nalla and Orangi Nalla whose homes were destroyed following an anti-encroachment drive. Most of these underprivileged families were homeless, and we provided them with ration boxes every week throughout Ramzan.
2021
That same year, we constructed the Sir Haji Abdullah Haroon Government High School Auditorium, which can accommodate over 200 people and also serves as a community hall.
2022
DawnRelief initially distributed relief goods to flood survivors in Balochistan, the Kaghan Valley (where we also constructed a cable trolley system), and southern Sindh. In early 2023, we built 150 homes in Bajara, Sehwan with the help of our donor partners, and another 50 homes in Jhankara entirely with our own funds. We have also built a school for girls in the area in which another was destroyed.
OFFICE ADDRESS
Dawn Relief, Haroon House,
Dr Ziauddin Ahmed Road,
Karachi 74200,
Pakistan
CONTACT NUMBERS
UAN: 111-444-777 (With city code for Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad)
Direct: Irfan ul Haq (+9221)35613115
Irfan ul Haq irfan.haq@dawn.com
DawnRelief, officially known as the Dawn Relief Earthquake Welfare Organisation, is a non-political, non-sectarian, voluntary social welfare organisation established in October 2005 by The Dawn Media Group.
