Basic amenities: RYK grapples with pressing problems

Funds demanded for public works

BAHAWALPUR: Commissioner Saqib Zafar on Saturday presided over a video link conference to review progress on development initiatives underway.

The conference also reviewed new development schemes to be included in the Annual Development Programme. DCO Zafar Iqbal said strict instructions had been given to ensure on-time completion of initiatives underway. He said several initiatives such as the Liaquatpur-Feroza Sewerage Scheme and the Abbasia Flyover had been delayed due to paucity of funds. Iqbal made the remarks while emphasising the importance of including Rahim Yar Khan tehsil in the provincial government’s Saaf Pani project. He said water in the tehsil’s urban areas was unfit for human consumption. Iqbal said many people had fallen sick due to this and had contracted diseases such as hepatitis. He said water filtration plants should be established in the district in accordance with the project to put an end to the phenomenon.

Federal Parliamentary Secretary Imtiaz Ahmed said Rahim Yar Khan’s sewerage problem had gone from bad to worse. He said its lines would get clogged if work did not commence on its extension project. Ahmed also called for funds to be disbursed to finance the Abbasia Flyover. He also pointed out that progress had stalled on a road being constructed between Chak 47-P and 51-P. The road was being constructed under the second phase of the Chief Minister’s Rural Roads Programme. Speaking in this regard, he called for road’s layout to be immediately altered and work on it to recommence. Ahmed also expressed his displeasure over the failure of the Provincial Buildings Department XEN to initiate work on a girls’ degree college and a nursing block at the Shaikh Zayed Medical College. He said salinity and water logging had been rendering lands infertile.

MPA Umar Jafar said the provision of clean drinking water and resolution of sewerage woes were the demands of Rahim Yar Khan’s denizens. He also called for the establishment of a sewerage scheme in Chak-72 and Islamia Colony.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 20^th, 2016.