SUKKUR, Jan 9: The city has been facing an acute shortage of water for nine days and the taluka council has failed to supply water to people.
A protest meeting was held in Rohri town by the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam (F) on Sunday in protest against the shortage of water in Sukkur and Rohri.
Speaking on the occasion, JUI leader Dr Khalid Mehmood Soomro said sufficient water was available in Punjab while Sindhis were longing for a drop of water. He alleged the federal government was treating Sindh step-motherly as its major cities had been facing an acute shortage of water.
He said a government which could not supply drinking water to people had no right to remain in power. Meanwhile, DCO Abdul Qadir Mangi visited the water works and urged the TMO to supply water to residents on the emergency basis.
He assured that water supply position would become better in two days. He urged the chief executive water supply to take permanent measures in this regard so that water supply crisis could be ended.
OUR MIRPURKHAS CORRESPONDENT ADDS: After closure of the Nara Canal for annual repair and de-silting work, an acute shortage of water has surfaced in the city, with people staying up till late in the night to receive water supplied in the small hours.
The areas which face water shortage include Satellite Town-II, Walkart, Rahim Nagar, Lal Chandabad, Gharibabad, Mir Allah Bachayo, Pak, Rajar, Ghousia, Nawab, Noor Shah, Jamnadas, and Hameedpura colonies, Basheerabad, Thamsabad, Hirabad, Adam and New towns and Nat Para, where people have been forced to get water through hand-pumps or from far-flung areas.
An official of the public health engineering department, Naeem Memon, said that since the city was divided into two zones, water would be supplied to each zone on alternate days from 8am to 11pm, and added that on Friday, water would be supplied to the Satellite Town zone.
He claimed that reservoirs of water supply schemes were full to the capacity; therefore, no water shortage would be experienced during the canal closure period.
MOTOR RALLY: Residents of Jhuddo town took out a motor rally in support of their demand of creation of Jhuddo taluka. The rally was taken out from the town committee office and led by Jhuddo union council nazim Mohammad Younus Kaimkhani, Digri taluka naib nazim Haji Gulzar Ahmed and others.
Over 200 motorcycles and cars took a round of various parts of the town to reach the starting point where the leaders spoke to the participants. They demanded that the Sindh chief minister endorse the creation of Jhuddo taluka as it was larger than Digri, in terms of infrastructure, land area, income and population. Deploring that Jhuddo should have been made a taluka but was ignored; they urged the government to take initiative in the matter.