KARACHI: The Sindh government through Public Health Engineering Department provides drinking water to 16.567 million population which is 53 percent of the total population of the province while its drainage schemes cover 12.513 million population, 40 percent of the total population.
This was told to a meeting held here under the chairmanship of Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah here at the CM House.
Secretary PHE department Tamizuddin Khero told the meeting that the total quantity of water required for drinking purpose in existing schemes of PHED is about 340 mgd: 122 mgd ground water and the remaining 218mgd surface water.
He said that the government provides water supply to 16.567million population of rural and urban areas of the province, except Karachi and Hyderabad which becomes to 53 percent of the population. Similarly, the department has developed drainage network covering 12.513 million population, which comes to 40 percent of the total population of the province. As Karachi and Hyderabad urban areas have their own drainage and water supply systems and organizations, their facilities are not included in above data.
He said that according to the new population census total population of the provinces comes to 27.888million in which 24. 91 million or 52 percent is urban and 22.975 million or 47.98 percent rural.
Minister Population Fayaz Butt said that there is sweet water zone where 184 urban water supply schemes, including 13 RO plants are working. They are Ghotki with two schemes, Sukkur four, Khairpur 22, Naushehro Feroze 11, Shaheed Benazirabad and Larkana seven each, Shikarpur seven, Jacobabad four, Kamber nine, Kashmore three and Dadu eight.
However, four RO plants have been given to Kambar. This shows that through 184 water supply schemes, including 13 RO plants drinking water is provided to 7.922million population in rural areas.
The chief minister said that the ground water quality in the sweet water zone is also deteriorating for which separate measures should be adopted to improve its quality.