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Pakistan's Sindh province is facing a critical issue due to the unavailability of potable water as most of the surface water bodies in the province are polluted and require adequate treatment to make it fit for consumption, stated a survey carried out by the Pakistan Council of Research in Water Resources.
The issue of water contamination in Sindh recently came in focus when residents belonging to five villages near the Gorano reservoir (Tharparkar) held a protest at a time when the Chief Minister of Sindh was visiting. Protestors at the site claimed that the Sindh government had failed to meet its promises made to the local people. They claimed that their homes and grazing lands for animals had vanished and several residents had become homeless due to the dumping of highly toxic water from the reservoir, Asian Lite International reported. A survey carried out by the Pakistan Council of Research in Water Resources stated that out of 1247 surveyed water supply schemes only 529 (42 percent) were functional in 22 districts of Sindh with an average duration supply of 5 hrs/day. Only 25 percent of water samples were fit for drinking while the remaining are contaminated with microorganisms and arsenic, according to the survey. The surface water bodies in Sindh are polluted with the degree of pollution varying from one location to another. A water testing report of samples from Gorano, Thar Block-II, issued by the Soil Salinity and Reclamation Institute Tandojam, has declared the water unfit. The report, (17 July 2020) states that the ratio of total suspended solids in stunt water is above 6,000 one part per million (ppm), deeming the water unfit for irrigation. Similarly, a report by the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air, (May 2020), informs that Thar will be a major air pollutant and mercury and CO2 emission hotspot in South Asia, reported Asian Lite International. Moreover, several parts of the province are inundated by floods. Torrential rains and flash floods in Baluchistan caused streams of floodwater to enter in adjacent Qambar-Shahdadkot district and the hilly region of Kachho in Dadu district causing severe losses in different areas. In Sindh, the village of MasuBhurgri (Hyderabad Taluka) has been in the news recently due to the floods destroying the cotton fields of several farmers. Torrential rains have left fields flooded and cotton crops destroyed. A Pakistan Institute for Development Economics report on Pakistan's Water Crisis shows that more than 80 percent of the country's population faces "severe water scarcity." Water availability in Pakistan has plummeted from 5,229 cubic meters per inhabitant in 1962 to just 1,187 in 2017. In terms of availability of water, the worst affected is Sindh province in Pakistan, where only 10 percent of the land area has fresh groundwater availability. There is hardly any availability of potable water in the province and a large fraction of water only breed microorganisms and death. Almost 78 percent of the province relies on saline groundwater which is not fit for irrigation. (ANI)
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