KARACHI: Nearly 915 water related schemes have been completed in Karachi while nearly 2000 others continued to be delayed, the Supreme Court was informed on Saturday.
Advocate Shahab Usto, a petitioner in the Supreme Court over a case related to the water crisis in the city, gave this information to the bench during the case.
Usto also claimed that Pakistan’s largest city faced a daily shortage of 250 million gallons of water.
The petitioner, however, said that the government had achieved progress in completing schemes related to sewage, and even the Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Mian Saqib Nisar praised the provincial government for completing these schemes.
The CJP also expressed his pleasure over the level of cleanliness in Karachi, and praised the Sindh government for actively pursuing drainage and sewage related schemes.
The CJP also asked Karachi Mayor Waseem Akhtar whether the authorities had begun clearing up the city’s drains since the monsoon season was approaching.
The Mayor in response said that they would begin work on drainage very soon.
The petitioner, Usto, meanwhile, suggested that the local government be given till July 2019 to complete work on the city’s drainage system.
The CJP, however, ordered the government to complete this work by December 2018.
Addressing the media after the hearing, the mayor claimed that he had asked the Court for a month to clear up Karachi’s drains, and said that he would give the orders to begin work on the 13th or 14th of June.
He also pointed out the fact that cleaning up Karachi’s highly debilitated sewage system was the Sindh government’s responsibility, and the city government had taken up this task despite not having the mandate or responsibility to do so.