Paddy cultivation to suffer

Posted on 11 months ago

Rice growers in the upper Sindh districts are extremely perturbed because the season of rice cultivation has started but water is still not released in the famous canals and such as the Rice Canal, Dadu Canal and other canals leading towards Sindh and Balochistan province.
Indeed, rice is a crop that requires intensive water usage and management and it is an established truth that controllers of water regime - those who regulate and distribute the water- in the past they used to supply water to the rice growers in this "rice belt" of Sindh province well in time. I vividly remember that they used to release water in the historic rice canals in the first week of May. Indeed, gone are days when water controllers and managers used to be genius and pro-poor, pro-people and pro-environment but nowadays those are scarce.
Besides, My Sindh used to have an enviable canal system to regulate the flow of water but now it is in decline. It is a known fact that whatever funding has been allocated in the recent past, both, from international organizations and also from the national exchequer is not judiciously utilized. Money crazy Provincial Irrigation department ministers, bureaucrats, technocrats and ancillary staff members have minted money and have become billionaires but the plight of tributaries and canals, and their embankments is haunting.
Since rice is a key commodity and it is an important to the survival of millions of people in this country, especially, the people of upper Sindh districts, therefore, I appeal to the President of Pakistan to take notice of this crime against humanity and direct the water regime controllers to release required water in the famous Rice Canal and other canals in upper and lower Sindh districts and save people from hunger and abject poverty there.
Hashim Abro
Islamabad
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