In the 2025 monsoon season (June to September), parts of north India and Pakistan faced severe floods. In the Indian state of Punjab, more than 50 people died, 2214 villages were affected, and crops on around 1,92,380.05 hectares of land were damaged. The last time Punjab faced a deluge was in 1988. In Himachal Pradesh, more than 400 people died due to flash floods and other rain-related incidents, and infrastructure worth millions of dollars was damaged.

In Pakistan, more than 60 lakh people were affected by heavy monsoon rains, nearly 1,000 people died, 25 lakh were displaced, and over 22 lakh hectares of crops, mostly in Punjab, were affected. Three years ago, in 2022, Pakistan experienced severe rainfall and flooding, leading to over 1,700 deaths and economic loss of around US $40 billion. To finance that flood-related reconstruction, Pakistan hosted a global donor conference with the UN’s support, where US $10 billion was pledged by the donor countries, much in the form of loans. However, by 2024, Pakistan received only US $2.8 billion of that amount.

Floods in both India and Pakistan were mainly caused due to cloudbursts. Mrutyunjay Mohapatra, Director-General, India Meteorological Department (IMD), stated that there is no increase in cloudbursts, which are “impossible” to forecast, but there had been a rise in “mini cloudbursts”.

The IMD defines a cloudburst as a fall of 100 millimetres/10 centimetres of rain in an hour or more over 20-30 square kilometers of area. The “mini cloudbursts” are a rainfall of 50 millimetres/5 centimeters per hour or more over a local area. In Pakistan, the mountainous areas, which are home to more than 7,000 glaciers, have witnessed a temperature rise that is melting the glaciers faster, causing cloudbursts and contributing to floods in the country.

Floods are not always bad, as they recharge the groundwater, fill water bodies and replace old soil with new. Most flood-related disasters are caused by human actions, such as unplanned and unthoughtful urbanisation, etc. In India, according to, “Towards Resilient and Prosperous Cities in India”, a report prepared by the World Bank in collaboration with the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs and Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery, if the pace of urbanisation continues without any remedial actions taken, the annual losses from storm water-related or pluvial flooding are expected to be US $5 billion by 2030, and between US $14 billion and US $30 billion by 2070.

Likewise, in Pakistan, unplanned urbanisation and fragile urban infrastructure contribute to flooding. The encroachment of floodplains in many South Asian cities keeps the impervious areas inundated for a longer period, affecting the settlers and people living near those areas.

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According to The World Bank publication From Risk to Resilience: Helping People and Firms Adapt in South Asia by 2030, around 1.8 billion (180 crore) people – around 89% of the region's population – will likely be exposed to extreme heat, while 462 million people (46.2 crores or 22%) are projected to be exposed to severe flooding. A study has also showed that due to glacial outburst floods, around 9.3 million (93 lakh) people in the High Asian mountain region, comprising the Tibetan Plateau from Kyrgyzstan to China, India and Pakistan, remain at potential risk.

Out of such a number of people, five million or 50 lakh live in India and Pakistan. To deal with the imminent climate change threat, according to the World Bank report, India needs to invest more than US $2.4 trillion by 2050 to build climate-resilient urban infrastructure. And Pakistan needs an annual investment of around US $40 billion to $50 billion until 2050 to meet the impact of climate change. Pakistan’s Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb has said that due to this year’s floods, “at least 0.4-0.5 per cent will be shaved off” from the targeted GDP of 4.2%.

Climate change-related exposure, threat and impact are linked with poverty in the region. Some reports estimate that climate change could leave 49 million (4.9 crore) people in South Asia in extreme poverty conditions, which is 10 million (10 crore) more than under the no-climate-change-related damage situation. In Pakistan, around 45% of the 251 million (25 crore) population lives below the poverty line.

As many past incidents show, climate change-related disasters do not respect sovereign borders. Hence, any effort to mitigate its impact requires cooperation between geographical neighbours. However, at present, the relation between India and Pakistan is at its nadir. In May 2025, India and Pakistan had their last military confrontation after 26 tourists were killed by terrorists in Pahalgam in Jammu and Kashmir in April. India accused Pakistan of the terrorist act, which Islamabad denied.

At that time, India suspended the Indus Waters Treaty. Pakistan responded with a pledge to act politically and militarily if the upper riparian’s action affected its water share. In the 2025 monsoon, floods in the shared Indus River System killed people, displaced the population, damaged infrastructure and destroyed standing crops in parts of north India and Pakistan.

To conclude, India and Pakistan may take steps to deal with the climate change impact in their respective countries, but a combined solution would not only be more effective but also more desirable.

Amit Ranjan is a Research Fellow at the Institute of South Asian Studies, National University of Singapore. 

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