UMERKOT: The people of Thar poured their hearts out to Justice Mohammad Iqbal Kalhoro, who heads a judicial commission recently formed by the Supreme Court to probe the state’s failure in providing clean drinking water and sanitation facilities to the people of Sindh, at the district court here on Wednesday.

They aired before the judge complaints about bad governance, contamination of underground water with fluoride, arsenic and other toxic chemicals, civic bodies’ failure to supply safe drinking water to people, mixing of sewage with drinking water, non-chlorination of water in storage tanks, delay in completion of Rs650 million filtration project, non-functioning of reverse osmosis plants and water supply schemes, unsanitary conditions and cultivation of vegetables on sewage etc.

They said that 70 per cent population of the district was being supplied water from Chotiaryoon dam, which was unfit for human consumption as well as for the soil.

Justice Kalhoro expressed displeasure over the answers to general complaints offered by the officials concerned of the departments of revenue, health, public health engineering (PHE), taluka municipal administration, Hyder­abad Electric Supply Company, as well as the representative of Pak Oasis company, which installed the RO plants.

PHE assistant engineer Abdul Qadir Memon informed the commission that water was taken from Thar Wah and stored in reservoirs for supply to general public.

The water filtration plant set up in 2006 was completed by June 2016 at a cost of Rs650m but it could not be made functional because Hesco had not installed transformer for the scheme despite receiving Rs3.6m in 2012 for the connection, he said.

The Hesco officials said the transformer could not be installed because the PHE did not submit them a copy of the demand note. The commission termed the reply a lame excuse and directed them to provide connection within a month.

Abid Ali, zonal in-charge of Pak Oasis, informed the commission that out of 52 RO plants installed in the district nine were out of order.

Justice Kalhoro was not satisfied with the official’s answers about water testing mechanism and expressed annoyance when he was told there was no water testing laboratory in Umerkot.

He directed water technologist Dr Ahsan Siddiqui to take water samples for examination and report to the commission within a month.

He asked district health officer Karmoon Mal and civil surgeon Dr Jam Kunbhar about disposal of medical waste and incinerator; the officials replied that they burned the waste in the open.

Displeased, the judge directed them to ensure proper handling of dangerous waste under the set guidelines of WHO.

Earlier, Justice Kalhoro, accompanied by district and sessions judge Nasiruddin Shah, SHC registrar Ghulam Mustafa Channa, Sindh chief minister’s focal person Dr Saeed Ahmed Qureshi, petitioner Shahab Usto, deputy commissioner and SSP of Umerkot visited water supply and drainage installations and RO plants.

Anti-encroachment drive

BADIN: A massive operation was launched against encroachments along dykes, canal banks and water outlets in Badin district on the directives of the commission recently formed by the Supreme Court to probe complaints about state failure in providing safe drinking water and drainage facilities to people of Sindh.

In Tando Bago town, police led by senior civil judge Abdul Qayoom Syed and the town committee’s chairman Khan Sahib Jamali removed sewage pipes and cattle pens and fish market along the bank of Bago Wah.

All buildings and structures were razed to the ground to ensure irrigation water was not polluted by human and cattle waste.

Similar operations were carried out in Badin, Talhar, Matli and other towns of the district by the departments concerned in compliance with the orders of the commission issued a day earlier.

Published in Dawn February 9th, 2017