KARACHI, July 2: The provincial and the city governments should announce a special package for the development of Lyari Town considering its limited revenue base following a 2001 delimitation plan which took away its commercial areas.

This demand was put forward by Town Nazim Malik Mohammad Fayyaz during a post-budget news conference here on Monday.

Referring to the half-a-century-old problem of water shortage in the town, he expressed the hope that the lingering issue would be solved shortly with the commission of new separate pipelines along the Lyari River.

The city nazim had assured us that 60mgd water would be supplied to the town after the completion of work on new pipelines, he said.

At the same time, the nazim added that the town had received Rs50 million from the city government on account of sewerage schemes and work on several schemes were under way.

The nazim said that the town did not receive grants from the city and provincial governments in full while its own funds had fully been consumed in disbursing salaries and meeting fuel expenses. This, he added, had badly affected development projects in the town.

He recalled that both the city and provincial governments had been apprised of the town’s weak financial condition and the issue had also been taken up with the president by the former town nazim, late Abdul Khaliq Juma, at the inaugural ceremony of the Lyari Expressway Project. He said that a sanitation tax would not be levied on residential areas but would be imposed on commercial areas.