MUZAFFARGARH: Though Muzaffargarh canal lining project is nowhere near its completion, the farmers whose land was earlier uncultivable have started benefitting from it as waterlogging has stopped since the launch of the project.

Lavish green wheat fields can now be seen on thousands of acres of land which had suffered waterlogging in the district.

“I have cultivated wheat on my land after two decades of waterlogging and the crop is in good condition as seeping of the canal water has stopped. Hundreds acres of other farmers are coming back to normal condition because water has receded,” says Malik Shabbir Hanss, a farmer from Mahmoodkot.

Ajmal Khan, another farmer from the area, says he is being called a Zamindar once again after a long time, adding his family faced poverty as waterlogging and salinity had damaged his 10 acres land.

“I was a good farmer in the 1980s before waterlogging destroyed my land. Now I have again cultivated wheat in my fields,” he says.

Khan is grateful to the last PPP government for starting the project.

Many other local farmers claim their land value has increased and the project has brought back prosperity for them.

The Rs13bn mega project of canal lining will complete in 2017 and its two parts will be completed by April 30, says Project Manager Muhammad Khalid.

He says water will be released into the canal on April 30, adding that most of the work has been completed but the project will complete in 2017.

Chief Engineer Muhammad Hasan says though the project was approved by the PPP government, it started with a two-year delay.

Officials said the federal as well as provincial governments had stopped work in 2013 but it started two years later when the federal government released funds for it.

According to an estimate, canal lining project will bring 400,000 waterlogged land back to fertility. It was to complete in 2015 but now it will be completed in 2017 due to the delay in its start.

According to the original plan, the project was to start in March 2013 when the then prime minister Yousuf Raza Gilani and former foreign minister Hina Rabbani Khar had laid its foundation.

Published in Dawn, January 25th, 2016