RAHIM YAR KHAN, Aug 19: President Pervez Musharraf said on Thursday that it was imperative to start work 'very soon' on one of the two proposed major dams - Kalabagh and Bhasha.

Launching the Rs66 billion National Programme for Improvement of Water-courses (NPIW), the president told a select gathering at Chak No 26-NP that "one of the two projects - Kalabagh or Bhasha - will have to be taken up very soon".

He said that although the feasibility of both dams had been prepared, the Bhasha project was likely to take more time to complete because of massive work needed to be done on the Karakoram Highway.

A parliamentary committee and a technical committee were preparing a report on the issue, he said. He was hopeful that the quarters concerned would soon reach a conclusion in the light of the recommendations of these committees.

He said that feasibility studies of the Skardu and Akhori dams would also be prepared. These would take at least two years, he added. Gen Musharraf held out the assurance that new dams and canals would benefit all the provinces equally and said that more reservoirs and canals were needed for the improvement of the agriculture sector.

He announced that 87,000 watercourses, 28,000 of those in Punjab, would be improved under the programme. The government had allocated Rs66 billion for the programme to be completed in four years. He said the programme, whose coordinator is Jehangir Tareen, would create 150,000 jobs.

He pledged that the districts executing their part of the programme on schedule would be rewarded. He announced Rs10 million as the first prize and Rs5 million and Rs3 million as the second and third prizes in this regard. According to the president, around 35 MAF water goes waste when it is allowed to flow into the sea - a loss that can be reduced by building reservoirs.