HYDERABAD, May 18: The Sindh Abadgar Board has appealed to the government to include Tando Mohammad Khan among the calamity-hit districts.

Tando Mohammad Khan faced a serious shortage of water like the 14 other districts declared calamity-hit by the Sindh chief minister, abadgar board president Abdul Majeed Nizamani said in a letter to the chief minister on Wednesday.

He pointed out that the worst sufferers had been the tail enders of the Sukkur Barrage, especially of areas located at the end of the Nara Area Water Board and Rohri circle and the areas falling under the command of the Kotri Barrage, the last barrage of the Indus system.

Mr Nizamani said the Kotri Barrage had received little or no water since January, creating the acute shortage of potable water in the entire Kotri Barrage area.

He argued that Tando Mohammad Khan district, a vast area of which is located near Badin, was a non-perennial area of the Kotri Barrage, but the government had not included it in the areas falling victim to calamity.

He said hailed the government for waiving water tax, land tax and agriculture tax in the calamity-hit areas, but feared that revenue officers might fleece farmers unless a clear notification was issued with regard to waiver.

The senior member of the Board of Revenue/Relief Commissioner of Sindh, in a handout issued here on Wednesday, contradicted a report which appeared in a section of the Press regarding remission/postponement of land revenue and abiana from recently declared calamity-hit districts of the province.

Stating the actual position, the senior member said the government of Sindh had declared 14 districts, Tharparkar, Mirpurkhas, Umerkot, Badin, Ghotki, Khairpur, Nawabshah, Shikarpur, Qambar-Shahdad Kot at Qambar, Dadu, Hyderabad, Matiari, Tando Allahyar and Karachi as calamity-affected area under Section 3 of the Sindh National Calamities (P&R) Act, 1958 for the sake of development schemes only to be undertaken under DERA-II programme by the planning and development department.

He said that no remission/postponement of government dues would be extended to the khatedars/growers in the calamity-hit areas as reported by some print and electronic media.