MIRPURKHAS: Political and social leaders of Jhuddo and Digri talukas have said they will not withdraw their demand for breaching the dyke of Dhoro Puran drain at Zero Point to save 1.5 million population of Mirpurkhas district from complete devastation.
Speaking at a joint press conference in Tando Jan Mohammad town on Friday, Mir Ajaz Talpur, Qazi Faizullah Sand, Qazi Noorullah Sand and others said that FIRs could not deter them from their struggle. Digri and Jhuddo talukas had been badly hit by flood and the only way to drain out stagnant floodwaters was through Dhoro Puran and LBOD drains, they said.
But the people who had occupied government land around Zero Point area had narrowed the drain’s passage, which had slowed down discharge of floodwaters, they said. They said that dozens of breaches in the drain had inundated a large number of villages but the Sindh government and irrigation department were not taking joint measures to save the large population of the district.
They said that they had launched a peaceful protest campaign to press the government to breach the drain and staged a sit-in in this connection but the government implicated innocent protesters in false cases inste4ad of listening to their just demand.
They urged the government to immediately drain out floodwaters and breach Dhoro Puran dyke at Zero Point to release floodwaters towards Badin district.
MITHI: Former chief minister and Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf leader Dr Arbab Ghulam Rahim has said that he is ready to cooperate with irrigation department officials for the restoration of natural flows of rain drains to prevent more damage in Tharparkar, Mirpurkhas and Badin districts.
He told media persons during a visit to the dykes of Left Bank Outfall Drain (LBOD) on Friday that the areas would continue to submerge during rains in future if a feasible solution was not sought to drain out floodwaters towards the sea and Shakoor Lake.
Pakistan Peoples Party rulers did not bother to fortify the dykes of LBOD and other drains which were weakened and many were washed away by floods in 2011, he said.
He said that PPP MPAs from Mirpurkhas and Tharparkar districts played dirty politics over ‘relief cuts’ to the dykes of LBOD. He himself had contacted irrigation officials but they were not in favour any ‘relief cut’.
“Engineer Zarif Khero told me that any cut to the drain’s dyke will cause more damage in both Tharparkar and Badin districts instead of providing relief to the flooded areas in certain parts of Badin and Mirpurkhas districts,” he said.
Published in Dawn, September 24th, 2022
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