MIRPURKHAS: Lead-ers of civil society organisations have protested over what they see as attempt by local officials of Environm-ental Protection Agency (EPA) and irrigation department to hold a public hearing without inviting representatives of farmers and get a no-objection certificate for a project for the supply of 200 cusecs water from Nara Canal to Thar coal project.

The leaders Sher Mohammad Solangi, Noor Ahmed Narejo, Aakash Hamerani, Aslam Mallah, Wajid Leghari and others said at a joint press conference at the National Press Club here the other day that no representative of local farmers and affectees were invited to the public hearing held at the office of director of Nara Canal a week ago, which was organised mandatorily to hear objections of the potential affectees.

They claimed that only four social workers and employees of the irrigation department and the agency’s Mirpurkahs office staffers, instead of genuine farmers, had participated in the hearing.

Hence, they and local farmers had serious reservations over the project because it would badly hit the farming community, which already faced acute water shortage throughout the year in the tail-end areas of Nara Canal, they said.

They believed that though the project planners claimed to supply 200 cusecs from the canal but in reality they would supply 500 cusecs, which would create severe water shortage in the command area of Nara Canal.

They feared that under the project water from Chotiyari dam would also be supplied to the coal project, which would render another 30,000 acre land barren.

They said the hearing without participation by growers was illegal and urged civil society, stakeholders and farmers keep raising voice over the issue.

Published in Dawn, December 11th, 2022