HYDERABAD, May 3 Sindh Taraqqi Pasand Party chairman Dr Qadir Magsi on Sunday voiced his party's support for the teachers who have been on hunger strike in protest against termination of their services and withholding of salary.

Dr Magsi accompanied by leaders and activists of his party visited the hunger strikers' camp outside the press club and criticised the government's insensitivity towards their plight.

He said that the rulers could only hear the sounds of bomb blasts and they had turned a deaf ear to the cries of poor teachers who had been on hunger strike unto death for past 20 days.

He advised the teachers not to put their lives at stake and assured them that the STP would support their struggle till the acceptance of their demands.

He lashed out at the government for not taking notice of the daughters and sons of Sindh who had started vomiting blood due to hunger.

He said that on the one hand, the government had surrendered to extremists and terrorists in Swat and given Rs500 million as gift to the racial terrorists besides spending billions of rupees on their own luxuries while on the other they were not ready even to pay salaries to the poor teachers.

Dr Magsi rejected the government's argument that these teachers had been fired because they were inefficient and added the government should have retaken their test through an independent organisation and arranged their training if they were found inefficient.

STP leaders Haider Shahani, Muzaffar Kalhoro, Hote Khan Gadhi and a large number of party workers accompanied Dr Magsi.

WATER SHORTAGE Expressing concern over an acute shortage of water in the River Indus, the Sindh Chamber of Agriculture has called upon the government to ensure water release downstream Kotri Barrage and into canals of the province.

A meeting of the chamber here on Sunday said that water shortage was seriously affecting Kharif crops. The meeting thanked Sindh Chief Minister Syed Qaim Ali Shah for granting remission in land revenue and other taxes for the year 2008-9 for Dadu, Qambar-Shahdadkot, Larkana, Shikarpur, Jacobabad, Ghotki, Kandhkot-Kashmor, Sukkur, Khairpur and Naushahro Feroze districts.