Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: The CDA is showing deaf ears to the spate of complaints lodged by residents of sector I-10 against mixing of sewerage lines with water lines in their respective homes due to negligence of sanitation and water supply departments of the civic agency. .

The inmates of street No 114 and 116 of sector I-10/4 lodged as many as 31 complaints on this issue with the CDA in the month of May last year. But sheer apathy was demonstrated by the civic body. Another complaint from 10 residents of this area found way directly to the chairman CDA and state minister for CADD but all this proved as a voice in the wilderness.

Talking to the Daily Times, advocate Zia Shah who is residing in house No 252, street No 116 I-10/4 said that he had filed complaints several times against mixing of water and sewerage lines but all his efforts had received a curt reply from the concerned quarter as the problem still stands as it is and a mysterious silence has become an order of the day in the civic agency in “responding to our pathetic plight.”

Saad Nasim another resident of I-10/4 said that when he cautioned the administration against going to the media and recordied his protest by staging a sit-in. The then chairman CDA came into action and the matter was resolved on a temporary basis and no permanent solution was found to our problem.

“Our children and all family members have been infected with fatal water borne diseases for using the contaminated water owing to mixing of sewerage lines with water lines and some elderly members of the family have become bed ridden and still some are on the way to fall victim to the epidemics hovering around every home”, he stated.

No heed to this problem by the civic agency is tantamount to playing with the lives of citizens, he added.

Waqar Ahmad from house No 254, street No 116, Syed Zeeshan, resident of house No 257, Sufi Arshid Mehmood resident of house No 217, Haji Idrees Khan of house No 255 and Farida Rehman of house No 215 told the Daily Times that metropolitan mayor Sheikh Ansar has been repeatedly saying that he is the elected representative of people and he is always ready to render any service in the interest of citizens.

They said that reports had come several times that new sewerage and water lines would be laid in every sector in the federal capital. “But we have our reservations in this regard because if officers of Grade 21 cannot resolve the problems of some streets of a sector then they should not talk of laying new sewerage lines in the whole of Islamabad.”

No action is taken due to sheer negligence and lack of interest on the part of the water supply department and the sanitation department and this indifferent attitude of the civic agency has put the lives of hundreds of citizens at stake.

They have appealed to the chairman CDA and mayor Islamabad to address their problem on top priority basis as they are on the border line of becoming prey to any epidemic which may erupt any time if the state of affairs in perspective of sewerage lines is allowed to prevail for more time.

The Daily Times tried to contact Director water supply but no contact could be made.

PIMS Spokesman Dr Waseem Khawaja told the Daily Times that people can suffer from water borne diseases, gastroenteritis, typhoid, hepatitis A and E, dysentery, diarrhoea and cholera due to use of polluted and septic water.