KARACHI, May 7: Angry residents of Lyari, perturbed over persisting water shortage and disappointed by indifferent attitude of the authorities concerned to their plight, took to the street on Saturday night and blocked several thoroughfares with bonfire to express their indignation.
Earlier in the evening, groups of people led by social workers of different localities of Lyari gathered at a place on Shah Latif Bhitai Road and staged a sit-in, blocking the road for vehicular traffic for quite some time.
The town nazim intervened to persuade the protesters not to create a law and order situation. He assured them that he would take up the matter with the authorities concerned.
Residents of Shah Beg Lane and Baghdadi union councils (UC-5 and 6) told the town nazim that an acute water shortage had been persisting in their areas for long and they had constantly lodging complaints
requesting the relevant officials to pay attention to their miseries. However, they added, the officials had never paid heed to their calls and no step had been taken to restore water supply as yet. They maintained that the officials’ indifferent attitude and growing misery had left them with no option but to take to the street.
The problem of water shortage in most areas of Lyari persists for years and in some of the worst affected areas, the problem has aggravated to the extent of a crisis. The situation has been creating resentment among people as most of them have to spend much of their time in arranging water for their household.
Residents of Baghdadi have complained that whatever quantity of water they were receiving these days appeared to be contaminated and even this unhygienic water is usually supplied far less than required.
On the town nazim’s assurance that the problem would resolved soon, the protesters ended their sit-in. Later, the barricades put up by angry youths during the protest were removed to clear the roads.
