ISLAMABAD, March 2: Amid Sindh’s demand for the release of its full water share before March 18, the Indus River System Authority meets here on Monday to take provincial irrigation secretaries into confidence over the latest water situation in dams.
In a letter to Irsa, Sindh Irrigation Department demanded that its remaining water share for Rabi to the tune of 2.197 million acre feet (MAF) should be released from both Taunsa and Punjnad before March 18 because it would take more than 10 days to reach Kotri.
Irsa sources said the water level in both the dams has improved significantly during the last rainy spell but the provinces had also increased their demands to the extent
that stored water would not be sufficient to meet their requirements for the remaining full month.
According to new indents coming from the provinces, water in Mangla dam would last for 12 to 15 days and in Tarbela for 7 to 8 days. These sources said although Irsa had agreed last week to release Sindh’s share by mid-March, it would not be possible due to technical reasons.
Meanwhile, Punjab has asked Irsa to minimise shortages as much as possible during the remaining period of Rabi instead of sticking to 35 per cent and not to try to carry over for the Kharif season.
Sindh has been demanding since last rainy days that around one MAF water should be reserved for the Kharif season to meet early Kharif requirements.
The Irsa had, however, held that priority would be to meet Rabi requirements and only then some water could be spared for the Kharif.
The Irsa had revised its estimates last week from 39 per cent to 35.2 per cent. It would also review whether this week’s rains also had any significant impact on storages.
The releases for Sindh have already been started from the Mangla to the tune of 10,000 cusecs per day from Friday but Sindh believed around 70 per cent of this would be lost in the long irrigation system from Mangla to Sindh.
