HYDERABAD, Feb 24: The Sindh Abadgar Board has demanded of members of the Sindh Assembly to reject all water and power projects that may be planned on the River Indus.

In a statement issued here on Monday, Sindh Abadgar Board president Abdul Majeed Nizamani congratulated the People’s Party Parliamentarians for requisitioning the provincial assembly’s session to discuss the issue of the Greater Thal Canal.

Mr Nizamani said that Sindh’s agricultural economy had been destroyed because of the water shortage as well as the denial of irrigation water to the province according to the 1991 Water Accord.

He expressed the hope that the members of both the treasury and opposition benches would take a conscientious decision on the water issue and would not succumb to any pressure or temptation.

Mr Nizamani said that even according to the official figures, Sindh was the hardest hit so far as water shortage was concerned, adding that the province had been suffering severest of droughts for the past eight years.

The water of the River Indus, he said, was highly contaminated with the sewerage effluent and industrial waste of the two provinces when it entered the borders of Sindh.

The people of Sindh, according to him, had no alternative but to drink this poisonous water and consequently thousands of people, right from Sukkur to Chuhar Jamali and Keti Bandar, were suffering from severe abdominal diseases and emergency had been declared in hospitals.

He said that no development schemes had been initiated in Sindh for the past many years and the province was being given only 16 per cent of the total revenue of Rs190 billion under the NFC Award.

Sindh, he said, had the highest ratio of crime, corruption and suicides by comparison with the other provinces.

He said that the acute shortage of water was the proverbial last straw on the back of the oppressed people of Sindh.

Expressing his inability to understand, Mr Nizamani said that there was no justification for the commissioning of projects like the Greater Thal Canal, Kalabagh and other dams in the face of drought and famine-like situation in Sindh.

The SAB president said that Sindh was passing through a critical phase in its history, adding that the province was being treated like “an enemy.” He said that this should be a matter of great concern for the entire country.