09 June 2004	Wednesday	20 Rabi-us-Saani 1425

MIRPURKHAS, June 8: Hundreds of acres of standing crops in Kot Ghulam Mohammad taluka were inundated following a 20-foot- wide breach in the Puran distributary, stemming from the Jamrao canal, near Mir Nabi Bakhsh Talpur village, late on Monday night.

Water also entered Chaudhry Sultan village, inundating hundreds of acres of sugarcane, cotton and chili crops, besides onion and other vegetables. Villagers along with irrigation officials were plugging the breach till the filing of this report.

BANDITS: Three unidentified highwaymen snatched a motorcycle on gunpoint at the More Jhango, near Dhoro Mari, on Tuesday, in the jurisdiction of the Kunri police station.

Hafiz Khalid Saeed was on his way when three bandits intercepted him, snatched his motorcycle and fled. No case was registered till the filing of this report.

ALLOWANCE: District Baitul Maal in charge Altaf Shaikh has said that the subsistence allowance is regularly given to the deserving people through the post office. He was briefing members of the district council at its session on Monday.

He said that some 18,430 poor and deserving people in the district benefited from the scheme. He said that under the Tawana Pakistan Programme meal was being provided at 159 girls schools through the Thar Deep.

Mr Shaikh said that a school was running under the Baitul Mall for labourers' children. Members called for a review of list of deserving people in coordination with UC Nazims to ensure that no deserving individual is deprived of the grant.

Earlier, the TMO Pithoro informed the meeting that during the current fiscal year Rs3.2 million were spent on nine schemes under the ADP and Rs1.6 million were utilized under the Khushhal Pakistan Programme.