KARACHI: Two former chief ministers have decided to take the current chief executive of the province and irrigation officials to court over the controversial Tori bund breach among others.
Former CMs Mumtaz Ali Bhutto, Liaquat Ali Jatoi and nationalist party leaders Jalal Mehmood Shah and Shah Muhammad Shah filed a constitutional petition on Thursday against Chief Minister Qaim Ali Shah, irrigation minister Jam Saifullah Dharejo, chief secretary of Sindh, the chief engineer of Guddu Barrage and the executive engineer of the BS Feeder. They prayed the court to constitute a judicial commission headed by sitting judges of the Sindh High Court to investigate the matter.
The petition has been filed under Article 199 on their behalf by Barrister Syed Yasir Ahmed Shah. Among other supporting documents are a few press clippings from the media and a briefing by the chief minister and irrigation minister, which reveals that the breaches of the Tori bund, Ghauspur Loop bund and BS Feeder were an “unavoidable decision” to protect major cities.
Talking to The Express Tribune, Barrister Syed Yasir Shah said that according to the bund manual, no one can touch any breach embankment even in high or super floods.
The petitioners have alleged that members of the Sindh and National assemblies belonging to the ruling party tried to protect their crops and fields, sugar mills and godowns by illegally breaking Tori. This decision affected around nine million people and caused a great loss to Sindh and Balochistan. Barrister Shah said that the Sindh chief minister and irrigation minister had yet to constitute an impartial commission as well.
After filing the petition, Bhutto, who is also a chief of the Sindh National Front, told the media that this was the first he had knocked at the doors of the judiciary after giving up his legal practice. “This was a man-made disaster and I have come to get justice for the people of Sindh,” he said.
Former CM Liaquat Ali Jatoi told reporters that Ali Wahan had been the reasonable place to cut the dyke, but this was deliberately avoided because sugar mills, floor mills, godowns and 4,000 acres of land belonging to PPP MPAs and MNAs was located on that side.
Talking to The Express Tribune, Syed Shah Muhammad Shah of the Save Sindh Movement said that a commission formed by the government of Sindh could not hold an impartial investigation.
He said that the irrigation minister had talked to the media on August 6 and said that they would probably break the dyke near Tori because the pressure was rising. On Aug 25, during a press conference in Larkana, the CM then publicly accepted that they had broken the Tori bund and that the breach had been “unavoidable”.
“If there was natural breach at Tori then why they did they break the second and third lines of defence such as Ghauspur and the BS Feeder,” he questioned. They have acknowledged many times that there was no other option, but to break the loop bund and BS Feeder to provide the water a natural course.
Another petitioner Jalal Mehmood Shah appealed to the people of Sindh to come forward and support them in order to expose the “black sheep” in the government.
Published in The Express Tribune, October 1st, 2010.
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