Daily Times

This is a replacement article for one I had to beg this newspaper to not publish on election night. In that article, I had wrongly predicted that the election results would shock everyone. It turned out this wasn’t the case. The results were exactly what newspapers, pundits and my friends in the know had predicted. How this came to pass is something that will be dissected and explained in the days and weeks to come. I can just offer my congratulations to Kaptaan for realising a lifelong ambition. As for the youthias, hopefully we will be spared their wit and insight for the next five years.

Regardless, the elections are done with and it is time to move on. In that spirit, I would like to suggest to the incoming government that it address the looming water crisis threatening our country. I base this recommendation on the 20 years of research I have done on the water sector in Pakistan.

Some of this academic research was related to the agriculture sector, which accounts for 97 percent of the water withdrawals in the country. It established that up to 80 percent of the crop water requirements in the country are met by groundwater in the country’s fresh groundwater zones. Yet, the massive aquifer underlying the Indus basin is being depleted.

There is a simple remedy for this. The only way farmers — at least the more successful ones — are able to grow water intensive crops is by cheating on paying their electricity bills. If the government makes it a priority to clamp down on electricity theft in the agricultural sector, not only could it address the circular debt issue, it could do wonders for imposing discipline on water use in Pakistan’s agricultural sector. The problem is that Khan’s new government will have to make difficult political decisions and alienate powerful stakeholders to make this happen, especially in Punjab.

Crowd funding a dam is not possible. Please make the rich pay their taxes fairly instead of asking poor labourers to part with their hard earned money

Secondly, it is imperative that abiana (water charges) in the agricultural sector are rationalised. That would not just mean increasing them, particularly in the fresh groundwater zone, where the groundwater itself is a by-product of the surface water, but also calibrating them by position along the canal and the water course. It is extremely unfair to make farmers at the head of a canal or water course pay the same price as farmers at the tail. If the abiana is deemed fare and commensurate with the water received, the irrigation departments can have a better chance of collecting it. Putting that abiana in the coffers of the irrigation department instead of the general fund will make the irrigation departments more financially autonomous and accountable. This is again a provincial subject, but the federal government can use the good old carrot and stick method to make provincial governments do what is needed, especially the Punjab government.

Third, in the saline groundwater zone, where the dependence upon the surface water is complete, even for drinking water, perhaps raising the abiana is not such a good idea. This is also because the saline groundwater zone is the most impoverished. Here, it might be useful to consider projects for canal lining and increasing canal capacity. Here again, the water charges should be dependent upon the position along a particular canal.

Fourth, the government of Balochistan should be persuaded to remove the flat electricity charges for tubewells. The province’s groundwater has been decimated by this policy, mostly to benefit a very small minority of big farmers.

The disappearance of groundwater from Balochistan has already had catastrophic consequences and it is time to undo that damage. Along with this, I would also suggest an increased focus on protecting the Karez system in the districts of Balochistan where it still exists, such as Panjgur, Turbat and possibly Kalat.

Lastly, please move away from this crowd funding of dams. Bhasha is technically not feasible because of seismic activity in the proposed region. Mohmand I know nothing about, but I am sure crowd funding a dam is not possible. Please make the rich pay their taxes fairly instead of asking poor labourers to part with their hard earned money.

I do hope for Imran Khan’s sake that he does not become the Cantonment Executive Officer reporting to the station commander, Pakistan. As Yusuf Raza Gilani noted — Prime Ministers in Pakistan eventually either go up, underground, out, or in. He counts himself lucky to have come home. Imran Khan was a great cricketer and an even better philanthropist. He may be a politician I viscerally disagree with, but can even his worst detractors wish him the fate of Pakistan’s least fortunate Prime Ministers? I hope he completes his term and finds himself safely back in Bani Gala when the time comes.

The writer is a researcher in Politics and Environment at the Department of Geography, King’s College, London. His research includes water resources, hazards and development geography

Published in Daily Times, July 27^th 2018.