KARACHI: The Sindh Assembly on Monday unanimously adopted a resolution in which the house “expressed the hope” that the Supreme Court would take cognisance of the “man-made disaster” which the southernmost areas of Sindh were facing owing to the absence of sufficient outflows from the Indus River to the sea.

This was the first time, as mentioned by the opposition leader in the Sindh Assembly, that the provincial legislature was asking the Supreme Court to take suo motu notice of an issue instead of involving the federal authorities or other forums of discussion.

The resolution was tabled out of turn by the senior minister for food and parliamentary affairs, Nisar Khuhro, on the opening day of what is likely to be the second-last session of the assembly’s five-year mandate, which began after a 50-minute delay with Speaker Agha Siraj Durrani in the chair.

Mr Khuhro sought the chair’s approval on the conclusion of the day’s business to table the resolution, which, as he put it, was a matter of life and death for millions of people living in the districts forming the delta of the Indus.

The resolution read: “The house expresses its grave concern on the failure and apathy of Irsa (Indus River System Authority) to check continuing and accelerating erosion of (the) most fertile coastal land of Indus Delta by the sea. In the absence of sufficient outflows to the sea, already an estimated 2.4 million acres of Sindh’s coastal land has gone under the sea. The coming rough conditions of the sea during the next six months are expected to devour thousands of acres more of our precious land.”

‘Thatta and Badin will be history by 2040 if sea erosion continues’

The resolution further said that under the Inter-Provincial Water Accord of 1991, Irsa was bound to ensure the outflow to the sea of sufficient quantities of water to check sea erosion.

“In the post-Tarbela period, Indus Delta has suffered on a large scale due to the shortage of fresh water outflowing into the sea. For the last 25 years, Irsa has failed even to determine the quantity of outflow of freshwater that would check sea erosion. It sadly continues to ignore the problem while crops, orchards and coastal villages are rapidly going under the sea and millions of those whose forefathers had been living in this most fertile area for centuries have been forced to migrate,” said the resolution.

“The house is of the opinion that this disaster is entirely man-made and has been caused by the sheer negligence and apathy of federal institutions. The land that has gone under the sea is the land of Pakistan. The people living in the coastal areas of Sindh are citizens of Pakistan. Basic human rights of these millions of Pakistanis are being continuously violated.”

The resolution expressed the hope that the SC would take “due notice of this man-made disaster and summon Irsa and other connected federal authorities to explain their gross negligence”.

It said the house expected the SC would direct the federation of Pakistan to take steps and actions similar to those that had been taken in other countries to protect river deltas and the people living in deltaic regions.

Industrial effluent from Punjab

Mr Khuhro, through the resolution, drew the attention of the Commission of the Supreme Court on Water Quality in Sindh towards the “constant menace of discharge of industrial effluent from Punjab into Sindh”.

“It was essential that these industrial effluents should be scientifically treated before their release in water channels and the house expects the commission to take up the matter with the government of Punjab, since all previous pleas from Sindh in this regard have fallen on deaf ears.”

Mr Khuhro said the federal authorities’ misconception that allowing water going downstream Kotri was wasting water was hugely flawed as that quantity of water saved lives, land and nature at large.

Opposition leader Khawaja Izharul Hasan said it was the first time the assembly was requesting the SC to take cognisance of the water issue. He said the PPP government in Sindh should also tell the public what was their own success story in trying to rein in Irsa during their tenure in Islamabad. He said the chief minister, also a member of the Council of Common Interests, should inform the public about his own contribution vis-a-vis the water issue during the CCI meetings.

He said the provincial government should play its own part in improving safe drinking water supply to its people.

Muttahida’s proposal

Syed Sardar Ahmed said instead of a vague slapdash resolution like that the house should discuss the whole issue threadbare, design recommendations and put them before the apex court.

Culture Minister Sardar Shah referred to a recent report by the Institute of Oceanography and other institutions which feared greater losses of land, fauna and flora because of sea erosion in future if the delta was deprived of sufficient water outflows.

“It said Thatta and Badin will be history by 2040 if sea erosion continues and by 2050 Karachi will itself be history,” he said, adding that sea erosion was devouring 80 acres of land daily.

PTI’s Khurram Sher Zaman said instead of waiting for the SC’s notice on the issue all the political parties should unite and raise the issue.

Sikandar Shoro, Imdad Pitafi, Ghulam Qadir Chandio and Abdul Bari Pitafi also supported the resolution.

Earlier, a statement by Nadeem Razi, an MQM lawmaker who has defected to the PSP, created stir in the house and upon insistence of the chair and Mr Khuhro’s warning that a censure motion could be moved against him, he withdrew his words. He was angry over former colleague Mehfooz Yar Khan’s request to the chair by saying: “There are strangers in the house who should be expelled.”

Mr Razi in his comment said there were certain individuals in the house who were ‘zehni beemar’ (psychos).

Nusrat Sahar Abbasi withdrew her adjournment motion after Irum Khalid, special assistant to the CM on women development, assured her that the issue relating to “sexual harassment of a female student by a professor at the University of Karachi” was being investigated by a committee in the department of the university.

The Sindh Holy Quran (Printing, Recording and Disposal of Damaged or Shaheed and Sacred Auraqs) Bill, 2018 was introduced in the house.

Published in Dawn, April 10th, 2018