HYDERABAD, Jan 3: Hyderabad is set to become a city district after a proposed bifurcation of the existing district and approval of one of four proposals, according to authoritative sources.

They told this correspondent that the decision is to be announced soon but there is a possibility of minor changes in the plan. Sindh Chief Minister Dr Arbab Ghulam Rahim announced on Saturday that a plan to bifurcate the district was under study.

According to the sources, the district's bifurcation will take place in accordance with the Sindh Land Revenue Act and its towns would be formed according to provision of section 9 of the Sindh Local Government Ordinance 2001.

Composition of a city district has been defined in section 8 of the SLGO titled "Creation of a City District" which says: "In addition to provincial headquarters notified by the government as city district of Karachi, the government may, by notification in official gazette, declare a taluka or talukas within one or more adjoining districts as a city district if, population of urban settlement therein or of proximate settlement exceeds one million people; economy thereof is largely oriented to commercial, industrial and services sectors; according to last census, labour force employed in such sectors or in non-agricultural sectors is more than 66 per cent and existing administrative and municipal infrastructure therein has become inadequate for efficient service delivery and requires integrated development and management."

A source conversant with the proposals argued that Hyderabad city fulfilled the requirements as population of three urban talukas was 1,120,580 and 90 per cent of it, according to census 1998, was associated with industries and other non-agricultural sectors.

He pointed out that existing infrastructure of water supply and drainage having become inadequate needed complete rehabilitation for efficient service delivery.