HARIPUR, June 17: The residents of over 13 villages staged a protest demonstration at Tarvana Khanpur on Sunday evening against the suspension of water supply to their areas from the Khanpur dam, some 25km from here.

The protesters, who gathered at the Tarnava chowk on the main Taxila Road, also burnt an effigy of the project director of Khanpur dam.

They accused the dam administration of violating the water sharing agreement recently reached at by the villagers belonging to Khanpur, Capital Development Authority (CDA), Rawalpindi Development Authority (RDA), Khanpur dam administration, officials from the provincial irrigation departments of Punjab and the NWFP.

Under this agreement, the protesters said that the dam administration had to supply 35 cusecs of water to the villages of Khanpur thrice a week, while for the remaining three days the same quantity was to be supplied to Punjab, CDA, and RDA.

“But the dam administration suspended water supply to the areas being fed from the Tarvana head on June 7 in violation of the agreement,” they said, adding that due to this decision the orchards and standing crops on thousands of acres suffered adverse effects. They also said that the cut in their share of water would turn the land famous for fruits into an arid zone.

When contacted, an official at the Khanpur dam, who did not want to be named, attributed the suspension of water to these villages to the decreasing level of water in the main reservoir.

Meanwhile, the dam administration with the intervention of local administration of the irrigation department agreed to release only 10 cusecs of water to these villages instead of the agreed share of 35 cusecs.

The sources further added that if the weather condition remained unchanged and catchment areas did not receive rainfall, the dam administration would have to stop water supply to all the beneficiaries by June 30, as the water table had almost reached the dead level.