LAHORE: Federal Minister for Water Resources Moonis Elahi says there has been improvement in water resources in the last three months in the country therefore there is no shortage of water for Sindh.

“Because of less rains and delay in melting ice in northern areas of the country this year, there was a shortage of 10.94MAF in the beginning of early Kharif, causing less availability of water for the agriculture in Punjab and Singh till June last. But for the last three months, there has been improvement in water resources, thus there is a zero shortage of water for Sindh. However, Punjab is still facing a 4 per cent water shortage,” the minister said in a statement here on Wednesday.

Moonis who recently took over the charge of the ministry said that in order to end false reporting of water wastage and equal distribution of water among provinces the federal government had planned to install telemetry systems at seven points.

He said there had been no truth in the chief minister’s claim of ‘unjust’ distribution of water to Sindh by the Indus River System Authority (Irsa).

“As Irsa is a protector of water resources of all provinces, wrong statistics on water releases were fed to him (CM Murad Ali Shah) who should pay attention on water theft in Sindh,” Moonis said and added it would be his utmost effort to resolve water problems by taking all provinces on board.

Published in Dawn, August 26th, 2021