HEAVY rains have flooded Nawabshah town and its adjoining areas. While roads have been cleared, there is stagnant water in lanes, open spaces, and in houses in adjoining low-lying areas.

A lot of people have become refugees in their own town as their homes are under waist-deep water.

Owing to the obstruction created by rainwater the drainage system has stopped working. There seems to be a total collapse or absence of public health engineering and town planning.

A great economic loss will be inflicted on the agriculture-based economy of the entire Benazirabad division whose total cotton crop has been destroyed.

The loss to the banana plantations is more tragic, 75 per cent of mature trees will wilt away and with it an investment of more than three years. The human misery caused by the loss is compounded by the vision of a challenging future. While the tragedy of lost human lives has been so far averted, the ethos of wasted human enterprise and lost opportunities can never be recorded.

The political leadership from Nawabshah should take up the challenge as an opportunity to rebuild the morale of the town. The era of granting favours has to end.

DR. SYED SHOAIB SULTAN Poor Patients’ Aid Society Civil Hospital, Karachi

Fake drugs THIS is apropos of the letter about fake drugs being sent to relief camps (Sept 28). This is pathetic and the government should take immediate action against such corrupt people.

It is correct that fake and counterfeit medicines have put millions of lives at risk. Many patients who were suffering from malaria, who could not have access to genuine drugs, are reported to have died in the worst-affected areas.

I request the authorities concerned to take strict measures against all those who are making and selling fake drugs and medicines.

FARRUKH IQBAL Karachi