LARKANA: PPP Sindh President and Senator Nisar Ahmad Khuhro said on Friday that IRSA is responsible for water shortage in Sindh as it does not have telemetry system to monitor the water flow from Taunsa Barrage to Guddu Barrage.
Despite the federal investigation committee admitted that Sindh is receiving 16,000 cusecs less water and recommended 20,000 cusecs more irrigation water for Sindh, IRSA has failed to give excess water to Sindh, said Khuhro while reviewing the desilting work of Rice Canal in Larkana.
He says that the Chashma-Jhelum and Taunsa Panjnad link canals, which in fact are flood canals, were illegally opened, carrying more than 12,000 cusecs of water. Instead of closing these canals, IRSA plays the role of a silent spectator which is highhandedness with Sindh, he added.
The PPP Senator said that despite the severe water shortage in Sindh, the current water scarcity load was being put on Sindh only and Punjab was getting more water share whereas the Sindh’s share was being cut. Water distribution should be made on the basis of equality among the provinces and the Chashma-Jhelum-Link Canal and Taunsa-Panjnad Canal should be closed immediately, Khuhro added.
He says that it is the international law that the first right of water belongs to the tail enders and even though, Sindh province is on the tail, it is facing a severe water crisis.
He said that after the Federal Investigation Team had confessed to receiving 16,000 cusecs less water in Sindh, it was proved that Sindh’s water was being stolen between Taunsa and Guddu Barrages or wrong data was provided. He said that the current water flow from Taunsa Barrage should be more than one lakh cusecs, but now there were 79,000 cusecs of water flowing from Taunsa to Sindh, which was why Sindh had less than 16,000 cusecs of water.
Khuhro said that Sindh had raised strong objection to the three-dimensional water formula because the three-tier formula was a serious breach of the 1991 Water Treaty. For this, we demand from the Prime Minister to fully implement the 1991 Water Accord made under para-II, and IRSA be made responsible to properly implementing the 1991 Accord in its true spirit while the CCI meeting should be convened immediately to resolve Sindh’s concerns.
He said that in order to improve the water flow in the Rice Canal, another desilting work had been started in the Rice Canal Command area from Ruk Complex towards Indus River at 14 RDs with a scheme of Rs160 million which would increase 7,000 cusecs more water in Rice Canal.
He said that the capacity of the water in the Rice Canal is more than 21,000 cusecs but due to the silt, the water flow in the Rice Canal was 7,000 cusecs which now would increase to 14,000 cusecs after completion of the second desilting. He said that in this regard, he had reviewed the work of desilting in Rice Canal from Ruk Complex and also directed the relevant officials to complete the work soon.