LAHORE: Two senior officials of the Water and Sanitation Agency’s (WASA’s) service have assumed charge of managing directors (MDs) of Lahore and Rawalpindi WASAs. The summary was moved by the Housing Urban Development and Public Health Engineering Department (HUD-PHE) to the chief minister through the chief secretary.

Muhammad Ghufran took over the charge of the office of the Lahore WASA, while Tanveer Ahmad assumed the charge as Rawalpindi MD a couple of days before.

The Lahore slot was vacant after the retirement of Zahid Aziz while the Rawalpindi was vacant after the suspension of the previous MD. It may be mentioned that the metropolitan city of Lahore is very critical, especially in the context of the monsoon, as there are 21 major points having a huge accumulation of rainwater during the rainy season every year. These points include Lakshami Chowk, Kashmir Road, Cooper Road, GPO, Lytton Road, Nabha Road, Qartaba Chowk, Empress Road, Ek Moria Pul, Do Moria Pul, Sultan Ahmad Road in Ichhra, Chowk Nakhuda, Bhatti Gate, Allah Hu Chowk, Qainchi Stop, Tikka Chowk, Firdaus Market, Shah Jamal and Jinnah Hospital. Therefore, to drain out the rainwater timely from these points, the Lahore WASA sets up 29 field camps in various parts of the city. Similarly, the role of Rawalpindi WASA is also critical in terms of making arrangements to avert urban flooding due to the possible overflowing of Nullah Lai.

All five Punjab WASAs (Lahore, Rawalpindi, Gujranwala, Multan and Faisalabad) have also been passing through a severe financial crunch for the last few years due to the absence of annual subsidies and bar on increase in the water tariff. The HUD-PHE department also sought a Rs6.78bn bailout package for WASAs.

Published in Dawn, June 13th, 2022