Construction of water reservoirs critical to Pakistan’s future: Dr Tahir-ul-Qadri

PAT Chairman Dr Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri has said that the construction of dams is essential for progress and prosperity of Pakistan. He said that criminal negligence was committed in the past by pushing such critical matters under the carpet. He said that we support the reform agenda of the government in the larger national interest. He said that Pakistan is an agricultural country that depends largely on the agriculture sector, which in turn relies on water.

Dr Tahir-ul-Qadri expressed these views while talking to the central core committee of the party via telephone yesterday. He said that he launched a campaign to raise awareness about the importance of the water reservoirs in 2012 and that the construction of water courses has always figured very prominently in the agenda of his party. He said that the matter regarding the construction of major reservoirs was made controversial due to corruption, incompetence and habitual negligence and the statements were knowingly passed on the dams whose immediate construction was not possible. They also turned a blind eye to the importance of building water reservoirs to cater to increasing demands by getting the resolutions passed by the assemblies.

Dr Tahir-ul-Qadri said that if the past rulers had wanted, they would have built small dams instead of wasting time on controversies regarding the large water reservoirs and this way, the wastage of precious water resources could have been stopped and cheap hydropower could have been generated. He asked if the construction of large projects such as Kala Bagh or Bhasha dams was not possible, who stopped the government of the day to begin construction of the small dams, adding that no resolution was passed against any such dam by any legislature.

The PAT Chairman said that there are more than 75,000 small dams in the US with every state having around 1800 such reservoirs each. He said that China has built up 84,000 dams that includes 22,000 major and 62,000 small dams. He stated that other countries such as India, Russia also spend their resources on the construction of large and small dams and to stop the water from being wasted. He said that India not only announces the construction of large reservoirs but then also makes sure that they are built. He said that contrarily in Pakistan, a lot of hue and cry is made on the wastage of water but little to no action has been taken to plug the leakages.

Dr Qadri said that the power hungry elite built huge coffers instead of dams and then in order to stuff it with dirty money, they kept their attention focused on staying in power by hook or crook. He said that we supported the government on the key national issues in the past and will continue to extend our support in the future as well. He said that the PMLN government martyred our 14 workers and subjected us to the worst reign of terror. Still we supported it on the National Action Plan to fight terrorism and extremism in the larger national interest.