MIRPURKHAS: Following specific instructions issued by Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah about a week ago, the irrigation department managed to drain floodwaters from both sides of a bridge near Roshanabad.

The bridge was reopened for vehicular traffic enabling hundreds of families to move freely between each of scores of towns and villages located across it.

Floodwaters had completely submerged this bridge in the last week of August and since then people’s movement along the route had remained suspended.

The reopening of the bridge has enabled people of Jhuddo and Naokot, as well as many adjacent villages, to shuttle between the two towns.

Most rural areas of Mirpurkhas district still submerged

SCA protest

A demonstration outside the office of the Mirpurkhas deputy commissioner was organised by the Sindh Action Committee on Friday over government’s failure to drain floodwaters from many towns and villages of the district and provide food, water and other essentially required goods to thousands of internally displaced people (IDPs), still marooned in affected areas or accommodated in relief camps.

Speaking to the protesters, SAC activists Manzoor Memon, Wajid Leghari and others condemned the elected representatives of the area and district officials over doing little for draining several feet high floodwaters still standing in their towns and villages for over 45 days now. They also claimed that donations received from abroad and funds locally collected by governmental and non-governmental organisations were being misappropriated while the masses by and large remained without any assistance.

They pointed out that floodwaters could not be drained from Jhuddo, Sindhri, Kot Ghulam Muhammad, Digri, Shuja Abad and many other towns and the surrounding villages. These IDP families had to flee inundated areas to save their lives. Due to inefficiency being shown by government in taking care of them, they were starving and were left without livelihood as most of them were farmers and their lands were still not cultivable, they said.

The noted that relief goods, including ration, tents and mosquito nets, were not being provided to most of these hundreds of thousands of men, women and children thus exposing them to water-borne, vector-borne, air-borne and other diseases. No suitable arrangements for their medical treatment were made either, they added.

All the donations in cash and kind were being taken away by unscrupulous elements within the PPP government and their cronies, they alleged.

They demanded immediate measures to drain floodwaters from all areas of Sindh to enable the IDPs to go back to their respective areas and revive their livelihood. They said all encroachments over natural waterways, including Dhoro Puran, be removed to facilitate speedy draining of water.

They also demanded that farmers’ loans be waived and they should be provided agricultural inputs free of cost in order to help them rebuild their houses and rehabilitate their lands. Adequate financial assistance also be extended to them, they added.

The SAC leaders called for desilting of Left Bank Outfall Drain.

Published in Dawn, October 8th, 2022