BADIN: The farmers and growers of the district have launched the decisive movement against the nagging water crisis and the reluctance of the officials to fortify the breached and weak dykes of the drains and irrigation canals of the district. The farmers on the call of the Save Badin Action Committee took out rallies and staged demonstrations in different towns of the district to register their protest against an acute water shortage in their respective canals and minors.
The leaders of the protesting farmers said that situations in their respective areas were aggravating due to the unavailability of water in their irrigation canals and distributaries for the past many months. They demanded the high-ups of the Sindh government take notice of their plight, else they warned they would widen the scope of their peaceful protest in their towns and other big cities of the province.
They also reiterated their demand to stop the ban on rice cultivation in Badin and some other districts of southern Sindh adding they made it clear that they would never accept such orders of the Sindh government, which according to them, wanted to snatch the morsels from their mouths.
Mir Noor Ahmed Talpur, Azizullah Dero, Khalil Ahmed Bhurgari, Syed Khuda Dino Shah, Ameer Azad Panhwar, Abdul Ghafoor Chandio, and other leaders of Save Badin Action Committee in their separate press statements deplored that the entire region was facing acute water shortage and such situations had created the mess for the farming community forcing them to come on the roads having found no relief from the officials. The leaders said after getting a poor response from the officials of the concerned departments they were mobilizing the farmers and growers of Badin and other districts to stage the long march towards Hyderabad in the first week of June to register their protest in a more effective manner. . They said that it was the height of the injustice to dep[rive the farmers and growers of the district of their due share of water adding they warned to widen the scope of their protest in each and every town of the district. The leaders of the action committee said that they would offer stiff resistance to any move by the Sindh government to ban rice cultivation in Badin district adding they said that persistent water shortage had already broken the back of the farmers of Badin and other districts of lower Sindh.
They lamented the fact the functionaries of both Sindh Irrigation and Drainage Authority (Sida) and irrigation departments on one hand had failed to ensure and just and fair distribution of water in canals and minors emanating from Kotri Barrage while on the other hand, the same officials were not bothered to fortify the breached and weak dykes of drains including that of Left Bank Outfall Drain.