HYDERABAD, Oct 5: Performance of the Hyderabad Development Authority and Water and Sanitation Agency came under severe criticism in the district council here on Thursday.

They called for a judicial inquiry into failure of the two civic agencies to drain out rainwater from various parts of the district which were badly affected by rains in September.

The council meeting, convened after a long break, was adjourned till Saturday by convener Zafar Ali Rajput.

The members will continue debate in the next meeting on the problems that have caused immense hardships to people.

Latifabad-11 UC nazim Ashraf Munna blamed the HDA and Wasa for bringing a bad name to the district government. On the other hand, he said, UC and taluka nazims worked round the clock to drain out rainwater and provide relief to people.

“Areas form where water has receded and now presenting a deplorable picture of filth as gutters are overflowing,” he said.

Nasima Khan said that in the absence of a proper drainage system roads were always destroyed. She called for presentation of any plan being considered by the authorities before the council to see how roads could be protected.

Rashid Khan called for an inquiry to fix responsibility on officers whom he held responsible for post-rains situation.

He disagreed with the contention that it was a natural calamity saying there were countries where such rains were considered normal.

He lashed out at officers who were interested in sycophancy instead of their duty and said that they would readily agree to catch moon, if they were asked to do so, without realising that it was beyond their reach.

“A committee should be formed to see who is responsible for causing tremendous difficulties to people for 20 days and losses to equipments”, he said.

He said that people had not yet recovered from their predicament.

Q. Mohammad Hakim said that the district government and civic agencies could have learnt from the recent crisis with much wider vision to get ready for making proper planning to avoid such situation in future.

He expressed disappointment that the prime minister and the chief minister did not give any grant for specific area.

He said that one representative of the district council should be inducted in re-constituted governing body of the HAD.

He said that machinery of HDA and Wasa was never maintained and their workers were not paid salaries for past four months.

He said that whenever subsidy was given to agencies they were diverted to liabilities of contractors or “cater to needs of officers”.

He emphasised the need for creating human resource development because diploma-holder officers with a limited vision of working were running affairs of the departments and challenged that they could not tell time period and requirement for draining out particular quantity of water in a specific area.

“The HDA and Wasa are held hostage by a few officers and their faces kept changing”, he said.

Calling for the devolution of HDA and Wasa, Yamin Soomro said that the situation developed when things were beyond their control and even diesel was not available for running pumping machines.

He agreed with other members that HDA employees were not getting salaries and called for appointment of a committee to probe the whole issue.

He demanded withdrawal of FIRs, registered against those who were protesting against authorities’ failure for draining out rainwater from their areas.

Mehboob Abro said that despite calls HDA and Wasa failed to respond to the situation and they even did not clean drains.

He said that pumping stations remained dysfunctional and even today water was standing in Qasimabad.

He said that through an ad hoc arrangement water was disposed of from one area to the other.

He said that the federal government had over the years given Rs15 billion to Hyderabad but no body knew where the amount would be spent.

He said that machinery of Rs10 million was purchased but not a single was given to his UC.

Bux Hussaini said that the inundation of units of Latifabad was a part of conspiracy and that people thought that water was not drained out in anticipation of grant by the prime minister or the chief minister.

“Where are those rain emergency measures of HDA? A judicial probe should be got conducted in the matter”, he demanded.

Shafqat Shah said that the rural taluka was neglected where katcha houses collapsed and crops were completely destroyed.

He said that the district nazim did not visit the taluka after the rains.

Ghulam Rasool Samoo regretted that when the district nazim sent a team of UC Nazims to rural taluka some UCs nazims did not care to meet the team.

He said that 107 pumping machines were installed in Qasimabad taluka, of them 40, were given to two UCs alone.

“HDA officers should be publicly hanged and black sheep should be shunted out of it”, he said.

He said that water was still standing in areas of Qasimabad and that needed to be drained out.

He urged members not to adopt an ethnic line while discussing the issues because it had been over a long period of time that Urdu and Sindhi speaking communities had come closer to each other.