Senate told: Islamabad faces 38m gallons water shortage

ISLAMABAD: Senate was informed on Friday that Islamabad was facing a shortage of 38 million gallons of water per day.

Responding to a calling attention notice of senators Hafiz Hamdullah and Ateeq Shaikh about water shortages in various sectors of the capital, Capital Administration and Development Division Minister Tariq Fazal Chaudhry said that Islamabad was getting 72 million gallons against a demand of 110 million gallons per day for around 2.2 million residents.

The minister said water was being supplied to Islamabad from Simly and Khanpur dams, water reservoirs from Shahdara and Nurpur and through 192 tubewells.

He said that a water project with the help of the World Bank was in the pipeline to lay pipelines to bring water from Ghazi Barotha canal to the twin cities. He said that except for Sindh all provinces had given their consent to go ahead with the project.

Chaudhry said that once completed, the project will cater to the water needs of the capital city for the next 50 years.

Answering Hamdullah’s query about water tankers’ role in creating water shortage and supplying the commodity at exorbitant rates, the minister said that only CDA tankers were supplying water to residents and private tankers were not allowed to operate in the city.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 23^rd, 2016.