MITHI: Chief Justice of Pakistan Mian Saqib Nisar, who had earlier taken notice of the unabated deaths of infants in Tharparkar due to malnutrition and lack of proper health facilities for expecting mothers there, is scheduled to arrive in Mithi on Wednesday (today).

He would visit the Mithi Civil Hospital to inspect the state of hygiene and healthcare facilities besides ascertaining facts regarding deaths of hundreds of infants in the desert region over the past few years as reported by the media.

The CJP will also assess the relief operation launched by the Sindh government in the drought-hit district.

The hospital’s walls were whitewashed and an intensive cleaning work was carried out at the hospital on the eve of the CJP’s visit.

Meanwhile, former MPA Arbab Zulfikar Ali, Arbab Khan Sahib Togachi, Arbab Imran and other political figures belonging to the Arbab group held a press conference at the local press club on Tuesday to announce that they would hold a protest in front of the CJP against the Sindh government’s failure to release water into the district’s only irrigation channel — Rann minor — for more than a decade.

They said a large number of Tharis, including growers, would take part in the protest as unavailability of water in the channel had rendered more than 45,000 acres of fertile land in Thar barren. They alleged that the government resorted to victimising Tharis for not supporting the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) in elections.

Published in Dawn, December 12th, 2018