HYDERABAD, April 4: The Farmers Organisations Council (FOC) on Wednesday demanded that the government should conduct an inquiry into the utilisation of Rs500 million funds the Sindh Irrigation and Drainage Authority (SIDA) paid to its favourite contractors as well as Rs600 million the World Bank granted for the rehabilitation of water channels.

The council’s chairman Javed Junejo told a news conference at the press club that the government had approved a special package of Rs10 billion for carrying out work on repair and rehabilitation of the fast deteriorating irrigation system and the World Bank had also approved tens of millions of rupees for improving water channels falling within SIDA’s jurisdiction.

He alleged that under the National Drainage Programme (NDP), SIDA issued tenders amounting to Rs500 million to its favourite contractors for the repair and rehabilitation of 72 water channels without seeking consent of local Farmers Organisations (FOs), which was totally against the rules.

The FOs system was put in place by the Sindh government in 2000 to look after water channels and watercourses. So far 240 FOs has been formed throughout the province and of them 175 are already administering the system under a written agreement with the government.

He said that after the FOs approached the council for help the council contacted managing director of SIDA and general manager operation but to no avail.

He demanded a thorough inquiry into the utilisation of Rs500 million the authority gave to contractors as well as Rs600 million granted by the World Bank for the rehabilitation of 125 water channels.

He urged the authority to acknowledge FOs’ legal role in all the future development schemes.