Indus River (3,610km)

One of Asia’s largest rivers

Flows through parts of India and Pakistan into the Arabian Sea

Pollution: How & Who

Like many of Asia’s great rivers, the Indus is a dumping ground for untreated industrial waste, sewage and waste from farms and fisheries, and sewage and rubbish from the millions of people living on its banks. This despite the hundreds of thousands of people bathing, fishing and taking part in religious ceremonies daily along the river’s banks

Effects of Pollution

Pollution is contaminating the main supply of Pakistan’s portable water and imperiling the 150 species of fish and 25 amphibian species (22 of which are found nowhere else in the world) that call the Indus home. Over the last few decades, both the diversity and abundance of aquatic life have been severely depleted. Toxic waste, heavy metals, barrages and irrigation canals have wiped out the Indus river dolphin in the upper reaches of the Indus. According to a 2017 WWF survey, the dolphins have recovered thanks to community-based conservation efforts, with an estimated population of 1,800 dolphins, up from just 1,200 estimated in 2001