Population to be Displaced 

There had been confusing figures about the number of people to be dislocated by KBD. WAPDA has been claiming a figure of 83000 persons, with 48500 belonging to Punjab and 38500 from NWFP. Whereas, independent observers claim a figure of more than 100,000 persons, to be the direct affectees of the dam. 

In addition, there will be people indirectly dependent on the water of River Indus, like boatmen, herdsmen etc, who will loose their livelihood because of the KBD. 

The investigation of the actual number of affectees is beyond the scope of this research, however, independent researchers have strongly questioned the reality of WAPDA’s figures, and consider them invalid.  

The WAPDA’s figures do not include the thousands of people who would, it is feared, be displaced in the long run, due to the feared water-logging and salinity in Mardan, Charsadda and Nowshera Districts, and the salinisation of sweet water aquifers in Karak and Lakki Districts. 

Further, WAPDA’s claims of the provincial distribution of dislocated people from the two provinces of Punjab and NWFP, becomes more intriguing when one investigates the background of the proposed resettlers. As the majority of people to be dislocated from their homelands in Punjab are Bangi-Khel and Saghari Khattaks and Isa-Khel Niazis, all from Pukhtoon tribes, like their brethren, settled in the Peshawar and adjoining valleys.  

While it has been pleaded that the dislocated people will be adequately compensated, the fact that the resettlement of these thousands of people will generate acute intractable social, administrative and political problems has totally been overlooked.  

It is worth mentioning that, a number of Tarbela resettlers at Guddu Barrage command have long sold off their compensation land and are leading a rudderless life, because of their failure to settle down in an alien environment. Whereas many still remain without a shelter or compensation after two decades of the commissioning of Tarbela.