ISLAMABAD, Dec 29: Advocates of the proposed Kalabagh dam seemed isolated on Thursday on the second day of a Senate debate on the controversial project, which drew support from only a few ruling party back-benchers from Punjab and more criticism from opposition parties and even a government ally.

Even a preliminary report on water resources tabled by a parliamentary committee of only ruling coalition members was not of much comfort because it reported a consensus of the provincial chief ministers over the construction of the Bhasha dam in the Northern Areas rather than on Kalabagh, with only the Punjab chief minister seeking a simultaneous construction of both.

While all the four opposition senators who took part in the debate blasted the project on both political and technical grounds, the most prominent speaker from as many of the ruling Pakistan Muslim League, Senator S.M. Zafar, did not utter a word in support of the Kalabagh dam and suggested an immediate revival of the Council of Common Interests to settle the row.

No support for the dam has so far come from any of the ruling party members from the smaller provinces of Sindh, the North West Frontier Province and Balochistan, whose assemblies have already passed resolutions against the dam proposed to be built over the River Indus in the Kalabagh area in the Punjab province.

While a faction of the Pakistan People’s Party (Patriots), led by Interior Minister Aftab Ahmed Sherpao, is reported to have joined the anti-Kalabagh movement in the NWFP, a back-bencher of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, Abida Said, declared that her party, which is a partner in the ruling coalition, would not support a project not acceptable to smaller provinces.

Mr Zafar, a prominent jurist and former law minister, proposed giving a ‘constitutional mandate’ to the 1991 inter-provincial water apportionment accord by getting it approved by the CCI, saying it should settle the controversy over the construction of water reservoirs whereas a violation of the accord could be challenged before the Supreme Court.

Prof Khurshid Ahmed of the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal said the country needed water reservoirs, but accused President Musharraf of trying to impose his choice of the project against the wishes of some provinces and warned that ‘Kalabagh dam could become a kala nag (black cobra) with serious consequences’ if that attitude did not change.

The presentation of the interim report of the eight-member parliamentary committee by its chairman Nisar A. Memon was also marked by controversy after the opposition said it had neither accepted the formation or the finding of the body which it said had no representation.

Opposition leader Raza Rabbani said the committee, nominated by the National Assembly speaker and later approved by a Senate resolution, was a ruling party committee rather than of parliament because no opposition member was named on it.

He described the formation of the committee by the lower house speaker as unconstitutional because, he said, only the CCI was competent to set up a parliamentary or other committee to make recommendations about inter-provincial water issues.

Mr Rabbani also put a question mark on the impartiality of Mr Memon because of his recent role as chief of the Senate standing committee on defence.

A committee meeting attended by nine members on December 16 had opposed planned purchase of some VVIP planes.