QUETTA: The Hindu community in Lasbela disrict has expressed its reservations over construction of a dam near their historic temple Hinglaj Mata.

Chairman Wapda Shakeel Durrani assured the community members that Hingol dam would be constructed only after removing all their reservations.

A high powered delegation comprising Chairman Wapda, Speaker Balochistan Assembly Aslam Bhootani, Chief Secretary Nasir Mehmood Khosa and representatives of Hindu community in Sindh and Balochistan visited the site of the proposed Hingol dam on Sunday.

The representatives of the Hindu community had expressed their reservations that with the Hingol dam planned to be built along the costal highwa would submerge their historic temple 'Hinglaj Mata' and worshippers would have no way of accessing it.

The Balochistan Assembly had also adopted a resolution unanimously in this regard demanding that the plan of construction of hingal dam should be abandoned.

However, Chairman Wapda decided to visit the site of the dam along with representatives of the Hindu community to brief them about the ways and means to save the historic temple in the area.

Wapda engineers and experts informed the members of the delegation through maps that Wapda was making all possible efforts to built Hingol dam adopting measures to save the temple. 'Hingol dam would be not being constructed until apprehension and reservations of Hindu community about Hingal Mata are removed,' Chairman Wapda said. He said that he was also aware about the importance of the Hinglaj Mata temple.

He informed that with the construction of Hingol dam around 90,000 acres of land would be irrigated in Lasbela district and the dam would also generate electricity that would be enough to meet the power requirements of the area. The dam would be have the
capacity of storing around 210,0000 acres feet water.

Speaker Balochistan Assembly Mohammad Aslam Bhootani said: 'We respect the worship places of minorities but on the other hand we cannot ignore the importance and benefits of the Hingol dam'.

He said that government would take steps to remove the reservations of the Hindu community. He claimed that the construction of the dam would bring a green revolution in the Lasbela district.