By Vishal Pathak, All India Disaster Mitigation Institute (AIDMI), India

Across the Asia-Pacific region, disasters are becoming more frequent, intense, and predictable as climate change accelerates and social inequalities deepen. Yet one of their most damaging impacts continues to receive far less attention than it deserves—the rise in gender-based violence (GBV) during and after disasters.

We build on the valuable foundation created by National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) at national level, Duryog Nivaran at South Asia regional level, ADRRN at Asia Pacific level, and UN Women at Global level within the Sendai Framework of UNDRR.

When floods, cyclones, earthquakes, or heatwaves disrupt livelihoods, displace communities, and weaken everyday protection systems, violence against women and girls often increases. These patterns are well-documented across humanitarian contexts, making clear that GBV during disasters is not accidental but a foreseeable consequence of fragile protection systems and unequal social structures.

Disaster risk reduction has traditionally focused on hazards, infrastructure, and emergency response. However, building true resilience requires recognising that disasters expose and intensify existing inequalities related to gender, class, caste, age, disability, and migration status.

When these intersecting vulnerabilities are ignored in planning and policy, preparedness efforts may protect assets while leaving women and girls exposed to insecurity, harassment, and violence in evacuation routes, shelters, workplaces, and public spaces.

This issue of Southasiadisasters.net explores how gender-based violence intersects with disaster risk reduction, climate resilience, migration, urban heat, displacement, and recovery processes across South Asia.

The articles draw on field experience, research, and policy engagement to show that preventing violence must become a central goal of disaster governance. Integrating protection into early warning, preparedness, recovery, and climate adaptation is essential to ensure that resilience efforts safeguard dignity, safety, and rights.

Ending GBV by 2030 is therefore not only a gender justice priority—it is fundamental to achieving inclusive and accountable disaster risk reduction.