MIRPURKHAS, Aug 8: About 3,000 acres of land, irrigated by Khai Distributary of Khipro Canal, have turned barren due to water shortage caused by water theft by influential landlords with connivance of the Irrigation officials.

This was alleged by the landlords, Ashiq Hussain Chhoro, Ramchand Khatri and Haji Zahid Mari, while talking to newsmen here on Thursday at the press club.

They said that in the command area of Khai Distributary, only five acres out of over 3,000 acres of land were cultivated and 170 out of 200 mango orchards had been destroyed.

As a result, the landlords said, economy of the area had collapsed and hundreds of peasants had migrated.

They said that the Irrigation officials concerned were responsible for the situation.

They said that Irrigation officials were implementing rotation programme for one month at their distributary while in other areas rotation was being implementing only for a week.

They lamented that sometimes water was provided to their distributary for a few hours only.

They pointed out that only 32 watercourses from the distributary were designed but the engineers of Irrigation department had, allegedly after taking bribe, added 16 more watercourses to it while its water capacity remained same.

They deplored that three consecutive seasons of Kharif and Rabi crops had passed but growers of the area were unable to cultivate their lands due to the artificial water, which had compelled the farmers to live on borrowed money.

They said that the resident of the area were compelled to consume contaminated water from pools as a result ratio of water-borne diseases had increased in the area.

They demanded of the Sindh governor, chief secretary and irrigation secretary to order a high level inquiry against continuous artificial shortage of water in their area.

DIES: A villager, Abdul Hakeem Kapri, who was seriously injured in an armed attack in deh 256, Kot Ghulam Mohammad taluka, died at the Liaquat Medical University Hospital, Hyderabad on Thursday.