LAHORE: The Water and Sanitation Agency (Wasa) of Lahore continues to ignore the dangers posed by open manholes and yet to learn from various accidents, including the recent incident at the Bhaati Chowk remodeling project, as many manhole covers remain missing in various parts of the city.

“For the last many days, we have been finding uncovered manholes ignored by the Wasa field teams. A couple of days ago, we also requested someone to help but to no avail,” deplores a shopkeeper at the Mirdad Chowk in Johar Town near the Shadaywal Chowk.

“I think they will come when someone dies or gets injured after falling into these uncovered manholes,” he said while lashing out at the Wasa authorities.

Since long, a number of incidents wherein people including children died after falling into open manholes in various parts of the provincial capital.

Clean drinking water also plaguing residents who are now opting for extracting underground water through pumps

In January, this year, a woman and her minor son died after falling into an uncovered manhole of trunk sewer at the Bhati Chowk remodeling project construction site. Initially, the government denied the incident, but later they found the bodies at the sewage water disposal.

Talking to Dawn, a resident of a locality along the Canal Road near Thokar, claimed that uncovered manholes were also causing traffic incidents.

“Recently, I witnessed a motorist checking his car damaged due to an uncovered manhole,” he said, adding that the issue was compounded as solid waste was being thrown into these open manholes.

According to an insider: “You can easily find several manholes without covers causing repeated incidents due to the failure of Wasa. I think, the system to resolve this and other complaints has collapsed leading to various incidents in various parts of Lahore, including Johar Town, Bhaati, Allama Iqbal Town, various localities along the Canal Road, Mughalpura, Shahdara and along various other construction sites,” he maintained.

On the other hand, residents of various localities have been facing serious issues related to water contamination.

Some of them have also experienced oral and skin infections after using the contaminated water being supplied by the Wasa field offices through tubewells.

“I suffered an oral infection a couple of times in recent months. Initially, I thought it might be caused by unhygienic food. Later, I came to know that it was due to contaminated water caused by leakage of sewage pipes,” a resident of Green Town said.

According to a resident of Johar Town, he and some others in his area switched to using water from a 600-foot deep bore extracted through a water pump.

“I did this after getting contaminated water through the Wasa water supply system. I spent almost Rs250,000 on a new pump,” he maintained.

Talking to Dawn, Dr Habibul Haq Randhawa – former chief engineer of the Lahore Development Authority (LDA) and an environmentalist – also termed these complaints genuine.

“There are issues of adulterated water being supplied by Wasa. Lahore has different networks of water distribution handled by Wasa, which are pretty old and they need to be replaced,” he explained, seeking immediate attention from the government to address such issues.

When contacted, Punjab Wasa Director General Tayyab Farid admitted the existence of these issues and sought introduction of a third-party validation mechanism to verify field operation reports.

“I have also discussed these issues and mechanisms with our chairman. They (Wasa officers) give us “All Ok reports”. But we don’t believe these, as these can only be checked and verified through a third-party mechanism,” he said.

He added that efforts were underway by Wasa (Punjab) and other concerned departments to improve the situation by holding the negligent officers responsible.

Published in Dawn, April 3rd, 2026