A WATER and power crises is hitting Pakistan hard , and water shortage is becoming a national security threat to the country. We are going to be in an alarming situation by 2025 if we do not construct reservoirs on the Indus river.

Kalabagh is a shovel-ready project. The site in Mianwali, Punjab, borders Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and is easily accessible to the national power grid. The site collects not only snowmelt but also monsoon flows. Kalabagh can be constructed in a short span of four to five years to store seven million acre-feet of water and produce 3,600 megawatts of cheap electricity. It will provide ample water to farmers in all provinces and make an additional 20 million acres available for cultivation.

Unfortunately Kalabagh has attracted strident opposition. and no government has been able to start the project despite its merits. Lower riparian Sindh claims Kalabagh will lead to less water for it while upper riparian Khyber Pakhtukhwa fears the opposite, flooding.

A no-new-dam situation, especially no Kalabagh situation, is what Pakistan’s enemies fervently desire. Without any effort except promoting opposition to the dam propaganda, they are planting the seeds of our economic collapse as well as disunity and distrust among Pakistan’s federating units. The need of the hour is more dams.

Ahsan Raza
Burewala

Published in Dawn, June 24th, 2018