It has been suggested that govt, by passing buck to India, is not to be blamed for delay in constructing Kalabagh Dam
LAHORE: John Briscoe, a renowned US water expert, has said that India could not have exacerbated the current floods in the Chenab and Jhelum basins in Pakistan. He explained that India does not have any large storage reservoirs on either the Jhelum or Chenab rivers, in part, due to the restrictions of terrain, and in part, to the restrictions of the Indus Waters Treaty (neither has India a large dam on the Indus which bore the brunt of the 2010 floods).
The media must look into its role in allowing to change the thoughts of those blaming India continuously. It has been suggesting that the government, by passing the buck to India, is not to be blamed for the delay in the construction of Kalabagh Dam. The media tends to portray a false image that shows Pakistani politicians to be innocent whereas the Indians to be at fault.
Did the media, even once, say that it is not the Indian agents who are opposing the construction of Kalabagh Dam? No! We should understand that it is our own politicians who have given air to parochial feelings by saying that Sindh will become a desert if Kalabagh Dam is built.
It is for the editors, the columnists, the letter writers, et al to tell the people that dams are built all over the world to overcome water shortage and not to create it. A 20 per cent shortage during the rabi season has been predicted for this winter. We have managed to survive without any increase in land for the last 38 years while the population has increased from eight to 19 crore — how many more years are we going to survive on the same 104 million acres of land while 22 million acres of arable land is still available? Approximately 80 per cent of this land is in Sindh.
We are depriving ourselves of water and agricultural improvement. No one sane will do what we are doing to our own country.
Khurshid Anwer
Published in The Express Tribune, September 20th, 2014.
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