KARACHI, Dec 3: A non-governmental organization has urged the masses to join hands to fight against growing pollution so that the future generations have a better environment to live in.

Shahida Welfare Trust (SWT) chief Shahida Kauser Farooq, at an Iftar meeting organized by the SWT at the Karachi Press Club on Tuesday, pointed out that the country in general and the city in particular was facing water shortage. She said that between 25 and 30 per cent of the water being supplied to the city was wasted owing to leakage in the supply and distribution system.

She said the issue was raised by the SWT which on one hand created awareness about it among the masses and on the other lobbied with the government, following which the government had announced plans to spend over a billion rupees to plug the leakages. She urged the masses to conserve water.

She urged the authorities to keep a strict vigil over the polluters and control pollution and said that if they failed to follow the rules, the internationally practised principle of polluter pays be applied. The polluters should be made to pay for their crime of polluting the environment, she said.

She said that, owing to the growing pollution, new diseases were being discovered in the people and wile the rich people got the treatment, the poor were the worst sufferers as the medicines were getting expensive.

She also urged the people to plant at least one sapling each and tend it for some time. She said that if everybody did that the air would become purer.

Her husband, Muttahida Qaumi Movement leader Dr Mohammad Farooq Sattar, was also present.