MIANWALI, Nov 21: The city depicts a gloomy picture of civil neglect: the poor sanitation, broken roads, overflowing gutters, heaps of garbage, absence of streetlights and above all, contaminated drinking water.

Tehsil Municipal Administration (TMA), Mianwali, failed to provide basic facilities and invariably turned a deaf ear to public complaints in this regard. The dilapidated sewerage system has created problems particularly for the pedestrians because streets and roads remain inundated with filthy and stinking water.

There is no doubt that the first impression on entering the city is very impressive. It is because of the newly built two-way road lined with flower plants, tall silver-coated light poles and glowing traffic signals. But the scenario is altogether changed as soon as one enters the city from the railway crossing side. Mounds of garbage, broken roads, missing streetlights, etc. are found everywhere.

The TMA received road-cut charges from the Telephone Department for laying the underground cable network some years ago, but it was dismaying that the authorities did not bother to get the roads repaired.

Doctors are of the view that epidemic diseases are rampant due to the frequent use of contaminated drinking water. The underground water of the area was once regarded as one of the purest in the country. Frequent complaints are now coming in that filthy water of gutters is being mixed with drinking water because the supply pipes are cracked at many places.

According to a survey carried out by this correspondent, the sewerage system had collapsed and nobody bothered to repair it. A couple of years ago, filthy gutter water of northern parts of the city, finding no outlets, accumulated in the football ground. It happened to be five to six feet lower than the surrounding area and gradually it turned into a dirty pond. Incidentally, this stagnant water pool existed close to the district Nazim’s House, TMA Office and Public Health Engineering Department (PHED) offices. Sportsmen and inhabitants of the surrounding area of the football ground made frequent complaints to all concerned, but in vain.

Nearly two years ago the Punjab governor, on his visit here during the election, announced a grant of Rs20 million for a new sewerage system for the city. The governor transferred the amount to the district Nazim, Mianwali, last year. This sum proved to be a bone of contention between the district and tehsil Nazims, as each wanted to spend it in his own style.

TMA Nazim Haji Khurshid Anwar Khan claimed that it was his sole responsibility to award tenders and to spend the entire amount on sewerage. But district Nazim Himair Hayat Khan Rokri has a different stance. He wanted to involve a consultant in the project. The tussle between the rulers of the district and tehsil has turned the city into a filth depot, and almost all gutters emitting filthy water. In the morning it seems that water has gathered after an overnight’s heavy rain.

Governor Khalid Maqbool was due here on three occasions but unluckily all his programmes were cancelled due to unknown reasons. The district administration all the time remained on high alert. The governor was earlier scheduled to inaugurate the Khushhali Bank close to the said football ground. So the district administration was trying its best to hide the ground by throwing bushes, reeds and kelp round its banks.

Social circles have appealed the governor and the Punjab chief minister to have pity on the inhabitants of Mianwali city by ending the dispute between the two administrators and to order for the early rehabilitation of sewerage system.