KARACHI: Experts and activists have asked the government and the company involved in the Thar coal project to resolve the controversy involving the Gorano Dam for the benefit of its native people in a manner that does not interrupt the country’s development agenda.

“We are not against development in Thar. The coal project is pivotal to the progress of Sindh and the country as a whole, but that should not be done at the cost of life and livelihood of its native people,” said Sohail Sangi, journalist and intellectual, at a panel discussion organised by the Irtiqa Institute of Social Sciences (IISS) at its office on Saturday.

He said the company involved in the project could have selected from eight salt lakes as alternative sites instead of Gorano, which was already a place far from the scheme and was densely populated as well.

“Lives of the people of the area are attached to the site for many reasons,” said Mr Sangi. “The people get their livelihoods from there through farming and livestock. And, cultural and emotional loss is equally important for them.”

He said water was public property in the region, where anyone could explore it and get it.

“But, the company’s designs suggest that they will virtually colonise water for running its boilers.”

Similarly, the company has promised that it would plant trees in place of every tree uprooted because of the scheme.

“But,” Mr Sangi argued: “They are not necessarily supposed to plant the similar trees that give shelter, wood and fruit to the native population. They would most likely plant useless trees and that too would be considered as the company’s property in the end.”

“This issue is purely a human rights issue.”

Mr Sangi said the government could acquire the land under the Land Acquisition Law for certain schemes involving general good, thus, a commercial company could not acquire such land under the existing laws.

Speakers said the site of Gorano Dam did not fall in the Block-II of the scheme. As a matter of fact, they added, it is 25km from that area.

“They (the company) even don’t tell us how much subsoil water is there. The experts have told us that there are three layers of subsoil water in Thar. The first layer is found 150ft from the ground and second layer comes even further deep. Most water is found in the third layer, which is salty and poisonous equal to seawater,” said Mr Sangi.

This water will come out during the scheme and one can easily imagine that what havoc it would play with Thar in future, he added.

Advocate Lila Ram, who champions the cause of the people of the region, said the issue had been raised by the people of the area themselves.

“It is a people’s initiative. We, the people of Thar, will resist anything that is against the people and the area’s ecosystem. We are not against the development, but that should not be done at the cost of their life and livelihood,” said Mr Ram.

He said all the political parties and other groups joined the struggle for the issue after it was primarily taken up by the people themselves.

Irfan Ahmed Khan also spoke.

Kaleem Durrani of the IISS moderated the proceedings.

Published in Dawn, January 2nd, 2017