KHAIRPUR, Aug 7: Chief Minister Dr Arbab Ghulam Rahim has directed all DCOs and EDOs of revenue to issue notices to the defaulting watercourse associations and get arrest warrants issued for their office-bearers if they failed to pay.
He urged the officials to ensure recovery of outstanding amount to meet the target of the lining of watercourses within scheduled time.
In this connection, the project director of National Programme for Improvement of Watercourses (NPIW), Mohammad Younus Dagha and secretary agriculture Mohkamuddin Qadri met DCOs, EDOs of agriculture and revenue and DOs of Khairpur, Naushahro Feroze and Nawabshah and consultants of NPIW at the DCO office on Tuesday to review progress on watercourses lining.
The project director directed the EDOs of revenue and agriculture to ensure issuance of arrest warrants to the defaulting watercourse associations and asked the consultants to avoid issuing verification certificates unless the work was completed as per specification.
He directed the EDOs to ensure they put down entries about their observations in the visit registers during their visit to the concerned fields and informed the participants of the meeting that Sindh had been given a new target of 6,000 watercourses to be completed at a cost of Rs1,500 million from the federal government grant.
Mr Dagha told the meeting that Rs60 million were outstanding against 400 defaulter growers. The DCOs, EDOs, DOs and consultants of NPIW of three districts attended the meeting. A similar meeting was held at the office of DCO Sukkur in which all the DCOs, EDOs, DOs and consultants of NPIW of Sukkur, Shikarpur and Ghotki districts took part.
KILLED: Unknown armed men allegedly shot dead a man and his father-in-law in the Dringh Chachar village near Mirpur Mathelo late on Monday night. Reports said that Idrees Dhoondho and Allah Diwayo Dhoondho died on the spot after eight armed men forced into their house and opened indiscriminate fire on them.
The bodies were handed over to relatives after autopsy conducted at Mirpur Mathelo taluka hospital.
The motive behind the double murder could not be ascertained.
PROCESSION: A large number of people from different localities of Sukkur staged a procession on Tuesday on the fourth consecutive day of their protest against unavailability of drinking water.
The protesters also observed a sit-in on the Golimar Road, burnt tyres and blocked the road for some time.
They said that their localities had not received drinking water for last four days.
They had complained to district nazim about the problem but to no avail, they said.
The localities facing unavailability of drinking water included Aslam Colony, Ansari Mohalla, Nau Goth, Golimar Road, Pir Murad Shah Colony, Numaish Road, Brohi Mohalla, Darzi Mohalla, Micro Colony and Nau Pind.
DIG: The DIG of police operations Sukkur, Ali Akbar Bhangwar, took charge on Tuesday after the government transferred DIG Syed Zulfiqar Ali shah and ordered him to report at police headquarters in Karachi.