HYDERABAD: Jamaat-i-Islami Pakistan naib emir Liaquat Baloch has said Sindh has legitimate right over its natural resources and stressed the need for a “national agriculture policy” for the country to resolve issues of food security.

The Water Apportionment Accord should be implemented in letter and spirit to ensure judicious distribution of water among all stakeholders, said Baloch at ‘Zaraat conference’ organised by Al Khidmat here the other day.

He said the government should pay serious attention to growers’ issues and regretted that flood-hit people had not been rehabilitated in Sindh despite passage of over half a year to the rain and flood calamity.

He said that his party stood for social justice for all. Sindh was a land of peace where hate driven ethnic politics was deliberately promoted. There was administrative chaos because of lack of accountability, he said.

He called for establishing rule of law and constitution in the country. Government’s policies should be based on research so that they could lead to increase in per acre productivity. There was dire need of ensuring availability of inexpensive farm inputs, ensuring judicious distribution of water and rationalising electricity tariff, he said.

Baloch deplored the fact that water accord existed but it was not implemented. The installation of telemetry system should be ensured to conserve and regulate water for irrigation, he said.

He said the growers were present in assemblies as well but they did not pay attention to issues of farm sector for their own vested interests. Since agriculture had become a provincial subject after the passage of 18th amendment, the provincial governments would have to ensure adequate price for farm products, he said.

He said that judicious distribution of natural resources could not be ensued for last 75 years. The country had always approached IMF and World Bank although “we could have got rid of them”.

He said that supremacy of constitution and law would have to be ensured and political parties, institutions and leaders would have to be made subservient to the law.

JI Sindh emir Mohammad Hussain Mahanti said that his party was struggling for social justice and hence it had always collaborated with representatives of farmers and growers for the preparation of a comprehensive agriculture policy, which was acceptable to all stakeholders. If agriculture sector was not given attention it deserved then everything would be lost, he warned.

Sindh Abadgar Board vice president Syed Nadeem Shah said the main political parties did not have agriculture sector’s development on their agenda as they preferred imports. “We had surplus wheat in 2019 but now we are importing the grain due to corruption and maladministration,” he said.

Sindh Abadgar Ittehad president Nawab Zubair Talpur said that prices were skyrocketing but rulers were busy in corruption and commission.

He said that farmers were not getting adequate prices of their produce even after making huge investment in expensive farm inputs.

Magsi sees digital census as ‘technical’ conspiracy against Sindh

Sindh Taraqqi-pasand Party chairman Dr Qadir Magsi has said that digital census is a ‘technical’ conspiracy against Sindh and this farce has been staged only to appease Muttahida Qaumi Movement and the refugees living in the province.

He said at District Bar Association Matiari the other day that it was known if the enumerators had been provided training for the census exercise or not as teachers had been given only a device to count 220 million people of Pakistan.

He said this device would not work without Internet and it would not work in half of the province. Amid such conditions how could the census be ensured in the areas that fell out of spheres of Internet connectivity, he said.

He said that when there were no funds for holding general election and providing help to flood-hit people then why huge funds were being spent on the census. Obviously, this farce was being staged only to appease MQM and outsiders living in Sindh as refugees, he said.

He said that Pakistan Peoples Party leaders Asif Ali Zardari and Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari were least concerned about Sindh and its people. They were only issuing scripted statements written at the time of no confidence resolution against Imran Khan last year, he said.

He said that according to that script PPP would quit coalition government this or next month as part of its strategy to have Bilawal elected as prime minister.

Published in Dawn, March 10th, 2023