148 points declared vulnerable: Shazia

The Sindh Tourism Minister, Shazia Marri, while talking to media during a visit at Bhanot Bund said that the province would experience super flood like situation after a long period and efforts are underway to meet the challenges and avert any eventuality with all precautionary measures.
She informed the media that a total of 148 points of the embankment of Indus River had been declared vulnerable in the province including three on the Sigiyoon-Matiari (S-M) Bund. She apprised that a team of eight persons in each shift would monitor every kilometre along the S-M Bund, while all villagers and dwellers of Katcha had been served notices to vacate their homes. However, she regretted that the people turn a deaf ear to the evacuation warnings of the government.
The Minister maintained that unlike Khyber Pakhtunkhawa, Sindh province had time to make provisions to deal with the approaching super flood. When she was asked about the usual practice of the irrigation authorities of taking recourse to ad hoc actions in the nick of time, Shazia while admitting that maintenance work should be done on regular basis cited lack of flood like situations in the recent past as the cause of the department's unpreparedness. The minister also alleged the previous government for lesser budget allocation to the irrigation department, which she believed, was another cause of ad hoc measures. She observed that it was time that shifting of the people to the relief camps in the area should begin because not much time was left before the flood hits the area.
The Sindh Minister for Inter-Provincial Co-ordination, Makhdoom Jamil-uz-Zaman talking on the occasion observed that water currents near the T-Spur further stay away from the embankments and which reduces any threat to the bunds. Expressing his satisfaction over the works carried out at one of the vulnerable point of the Indus River, Makhdoom Jamil-uz-Zaman informed that he was the first to raise the concerns about the change of the river course, which had the potential to wash away the Talukas of Hala and Matiari in the event of breach in Bhanot Bund, in Sindh Assembly in 1997, when Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) was in the opposition. "The then Corpse Commander Karachi himself visited the bund and subsequently measures were taken for its strengthening," the minister divulged.
He though admitted that the embankments there had become old and threat of a breach could not be ruled out with certitude, but added that the river currents were moving further away from the bunds.
Earlier, while briefing the ministers Superintending Engineer Rohri Canal, Babar Afandi informed that Reduced Level (RL) at Bhanot Bund was 102 or 80 feet, while presently the water level stood at 88.5 feet. He informed that over 700,000 cusecs would pass through the Bhanot Embankment. He said before 2006 the embankment was considered vulnerable but after the reinforcement work, which started in the year 2002 and completed in 2006, the strength of the bund had multiplied. The water current was away from the embankments and it would move still farther with increase in the discharge from upstream Sukkur, he added.