K-IV water project awaits completion

As the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) completes three successive terms of maintaining an electoral majority in Sindh, ample scrutiny is being drawn to its inability to complete the K-IV water project, which was the last hope for putting an end to the water crisis plaguing locals in Karachi.

Despite the Karachi Water and Sewerage Board (KWSB) making tall claims of resolving the water scarcity issue disrupting the flow of life for citizens, outright negligence on the part of the supervising bodies has led to an unwarranted delay in the completion of the K-IV water project, which after its launch in 2016 was expected to improve the water levels in the province through two separate phases.

"The performance of the Sindh government vis-a-vis K-IV so far has been completely disappointing. Technically, the federal government was responsible for installing a 120 km pipeline from Keenjhar Lake to the Kirthar Range whereas the Sindh government was tasked with the augmentation plan for connecting the Kirthar Range to the bulk system. Unfortunately, the augmentation plan continues to be on hold," revealed an officer from the KWSB, on the condition of anonymity, who went on to disclose that no plan had been devised for the improvement of the local water distribution system either.

Read Phase-I of K-IV project to be completed in 2024

According to sources from KWSB, the local water distribution system in Sindh, is plagued with multiple issues including water leakage and theft alongside a lack of capacity in the canal system, which has reduced the level of water by 30 per cent from the maximum approved level of 650 million gallons per day to only 420 million gallons. 

In light of the decreasing water levels, completion of the K-IV Phase 1 project, which would supply 260 million gallons of water, has become ever more pertinent.

However, delays on part of the Sindh government meant that only 15 per cent of the project work had been completed by 2018 before it was stopped altogether in 2019 due to rising costs and design failure. Later on, in 2021 the Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA) took over the K-IV project from the Sindh government and nullified all of the previous efforts put in by the former stakeholder, further leading to a delay in the project's culmination. 

Similarly, Phase 2 of the K-IV water project, which aimed to supply 130 million gallons per day of water, was divided equally between the Sindh government and the World Bank however, poor planning, led to the closure of the first phase of the project in 2019, at a point when only 12 per cent of the work had been completed.

On the other hand, the latter half assigned to the World Bank has yet to be initiated. It is worth mentioning that it has been over 17 years since the last water project, the K-III, reached completion in 2006, during the tenure of former president Pervez Musharraf.

What is even more troubling is that even when the K-IV project does reach fruition, the existing water lines, which are 50 years old and in a dilapidated condition, means that they would be unable to bear the added pressure of the excess water.

The Express Tribune reached out to Rafique Qureshi, Project Director of the Karachi Water and Sewerage Services Improvement Project, to seek an explanation from the concerned authority. However, Qureshi refused to answer any questions on the grounds that it was the duty of the KWSB to answer the press and the KWSSIP was only tasked with assisting the World Bank with its initiatives in Pakistan.