MULTAN, Dec 10: Water supplied to Multan residents is unsafe for human consumption and causing hepatitis C, diarrhea, gastroenteritis and other diseases, revealed a survey report issued here on Saturday.

The Sojhla, a non-government organisation (NGO), in connection with its campaign ‘Aman Mera Haq’ marked the Human Rights Day by organising a rally titled “Safe and clean drinking water – my right”.

Earlier, the NGO conducted a study on the status of drinking water in different areas of Multan at the union council level.

During the survey carried out in Tahirpur, Nawabpur, Bhinda Sandila, Muhammad Pur Ghota, Basti Laar, Chaks 4, 5, 14 and 7 Faiz, condition and effects of poor quality of water supplied by public departments were examined. The samples were got tested from the Pakistan Council of Research in Water Resources.

In the light of the findings of the survey, it transpired that the water being supplied to the community was not only unsafe for drinking purposes but was also the main reason behind the prevalence of hepatitis C, diarrhea, gastroenteritis and other diseases.

Addressing the participants of the rally, Zahoor Joiya, of Sojhla, said that provision of drinking water was the basic duty of the government towards citizens.

“We have huge water resources but the government is doing nothing to make them clean and supply potable water. Even the filtration plants installed by the government have not been taken care of afterwards. The industrial waste is the main pollutant with which the drinking water gets contaminated,” he added.

Iftikhar Hasan, of Sojhla, said according to a government report too, the water being used in Multan for drinking purposes was highly polluted.

He said residents of Multan had been drinking this water for long and becoming victims of hepatic and gastric diseases. One of the reasons behind the provision of polluted water was negligence of water and sanitation agency officials.

“Owing to this negligence, underground sewerage and water pipelines burst after every now and then, mixing pure and contaminated water which the citizens drink unknowingly and fall prey to hazardous diseases,” he said.

Former MPA Nafees Ahmed Insari said the figures of Nishter Hospital Multan revealed that 350 patients had expired only because of using unsafe water and 7,020 people had contracted dangerous diseases during last 12 months.

Sohail Javed, of the Labour Party Pakistan, said 50 per cent of the population had no option except to drink polluted water. He said according to a study, only 63.48 million gallons was being supplied by government agencies to the population of Multan against its daily demand of 99 million gallons.

He said the World Health Organisation funded a project to install water purification plants at UC level but this project had not been completed as yet despite its deadline had lapsed since long ago.

“Moreover, after the installation of such plants, the filter has never been replaced nor is there any system in place to carry out the replacement. And the citizens fetch same polluted water from these filtration plants too,” he added.

Dr Jan Nisar said if citizens got access to potable water, 60 per cent of diseases would automatically disappear, saving huge resources of government being invested in health sector.

Noshi Mahmood, Samina Jaffery, Naseem, Zubair Sunny, Qaswar, Zafar Shaheen, Afshan Bhatti, Faisal Raheem, Dr Aslam Joiya, Zeeshan, Iqbal, Muneer Shirazi and others participated in the rally.

Meanwhile, at another seminar titled “State of human rights in South Punjab”, speakers including Zahra Sajjad Zedi, Prof Iqbal Shah, Islamuddin and Zubair Malik said that economic rights of the people of southern Punjab were at stake as the area was facing acute unemployment, poverty and deprivation.

They said the poor educational and health facilities were other factors worsening the miserable condition of the inhabitants of the Seraiki belt.—Staff Correspondent