Watan Card protests take new turn

Flood victims block roads and break windows over govt ‘apathy.'

MUZAFFARGARH: Flood victims in various parts of Southern Punjab have protested against the local administration and federal government for not receiving Watan Cards despite a severe food crisis in affected areas.

The protesters said that the destruction of crops on thousands of acres of land and the delay in government aid had caused severe problems and that locals were now in the midst of a severe food crisis.

In Rajanpur, Dera Ghazi Khan, Taunsa, Muzaffargarh, Rohelawali, Shehr Sultan, Mehmood Kot, Kot Addu, Sanawan and other areas crops on hundreds of thousands of acres were completely decimated during the floods. “We lost everything. Our crops were both our source of food and income and now we depend completely on the government and there is no help,” said Shehr Sultan resident Jamaluddin.

Agriculture experts said that the cultivation of wheat for next season would begin from October 25, 2010 but the agriculture department had done nothing to prepare the land in this regard.

“If the situation persists then the food crisis will most likely be prolonged and we may experience a severe shortage next year,” said farmer Khurram Baig.

In Muzaffargarh’s Shah Jamal area hundreds of people protested outside the National Database Registration Authority (Nadra) office. The office had been designated as one of the many spots in the district for the distribution of Watan Cards and protestors broke windows and lay down on the main road leading to the office.

Protestors said that the authorities had ‘forged’ the lists of Watan Cards recipients to suit their own ends. “The names on every list include at least thirty people who are relatives of the bank manager or the DO,” said Malik, a flood victim from Layyah.

In Layyah flood-affected people protested for the third day outside a Nadra office for not having received their Watan Cards. Hundreds of flood affected people also observed a sit-in outside the office. Nowshera Nasheb Chak 117 B, 149 B and C affectees said that the revenue staff had not included their names in the list because of personal grudges. “We have been protesting for a while now and the authorities told us that if we protested all our names would be switched with others,” said Khawar Sial, a flood victim who had participated in all the protests. “They have threatened us saying that they will remove our names from the list but it hardly matters since they don’t even place our names on the list,” said Naveed.

“These lists seem to be reserved for their friends and family,” he said, accusing the local administration officers.

Flood victims also protested outside the commissioner’s office for not providing them aid, which they said was due to the negligence of the Finance Department. Dozens of Sargodha residents from Jhawarian protested outside the commissioner’s office. The protestors said that they went to their relatives houses to save themselves from the floods but this was being counted against them. “Several of the survey teams told me I wouldn’t get paid for my losses because I already had a roof over my head,” Salman said, adding “They don’t realise that my entire family is cramped in with my sister’s family in one room.”

The protesters said that the Finance Department had not included their names in the list because they were already being given shelter by their relatives.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 17^th, 2010.