Pakistan Cotton Ginners Association's (PCGA) Vice Chairman Sheikh Aasim Saeed on Sunday demanded of the government to declare flood-affected region of Southern Punjab as calamity-hit area. He also demanded that all kinds of taxes and levies be waived to compensate the affected people, besides payment of utility bills should be deferred for at least two months without surcharge.
The PCGA vice chairman along with Group Chairman Haji Muhammad Akram, Shehzad Ali Khan and Rao Sadaruddin was speaking at a press conference here on Sunday. He also urged the government to immediately withdraw five per cent sales tax levied on oil-cake (Khal)to express solidarity with the flood-affected people.
He said that recent floods had devastated the cotton, sugarcane, fodder crops in Jhang, Muzaffargarh,Dera Ghazi Khan and Multan districts, besides destroying their livestock.
PCGA demanded immediate assessment of the financial and human losses caused by recent floods in River Chenab in Multan, Bahawalpur and Dera Ghazi Khan divisions and payment of reasonable financial assistance and compensation to the affectees so that they could stand on their feet.
PCGA said that a comprehensive survey of flood-hit areas of Muzaffargarh, Multan, Shujabad, Jalalpur Pirwala, Khangarh, Rangpur, Alipur, Shehr Sultan, Liaquatpur, Ahmedpur East, Uch Sharif, Bahawalpur, must be carried out immediately. The PCGA office-bearers also recommended that free seed, fertilisers should be provided to the farmers having up to 12.5 acres of land.
At the outset, the PCGA reiterated its demand for construction of small dams in Dera Ghazi Khan to store water of hill torrents and saving the millions of acres of land from the ravages of flood. PCGA said that delay in remission of taxes for flood-hit people would tantamount to add to their miseries. PCGA teams are preparing a comprehensive list of losses of cotton in Southern Punjab, they added.