Karachi: Caretaker Chief Minister Sindh Justice (retd) Maqbool Baqer presided over meeting at Divisional Commissioner’s House in Sukkur, focusing on Sukkur’s development portfolio and flood damages and rehabilitation.

Brigadier Haris Nawaz, Barrister Umar Soomro, Ashar Lal, Principal Secretary Hasan Naqvi, Secretary School education Sheerin Narejo, Secretary Health Dr. Mansoor, Secretary Works and Services Muhammad Nawaz Sohu, relevant officers were present.

During meeting, Chief Minister Sindh expressed purpose of his visit to Sukkur, which was to assess city’s health, sanitation, flood damage and other issues. He instructed Secretary of Works and Services to clear roads of the city of soil, emphasising need for improved sanitation arrangements in Sukkur.

He gave three-week deadline to Sukkur district administration to remove garbage and floodwater from  roads, warning that he would not spare anyone if city remained dirty.

Chief Minister  pointed out poor conditions of police stations and district headquarters hospital in Sukkur, criticising lack of honesty in performance of their duties. He emphasised proper cleaning of broken roads, sewers and streets.

Divisional Commissioner Sukkur, Samiuddin Siddiqui and his team briefed caretaker CM on flood-related rehabilitation projects. Sukkur division comprises 18 talukas, 288 Union Councils, covering 27,158 kilometers of land and includes Khairpur, Ghotki and Sukkur districts. According to recent census, Sukkur division has 1,052,475 houses and population of 6 million with household ratio of 5.7 and an overall development rate of 1.36.

In briefing, Chief Minister was informed about presence of 5,239 primary, 171 middle, 248 elementary, 210 secondary and 85 higher secondary schools across division.

Briefing highlighted impact of 2022 floods, which affected 891,238 people in Sukkur division, damaged 442,922 houses, destroyed 59,305.20 acres of agricultural land and led to loss of 120,820 cattle.

New development schemes have been planned for Sukkur division in financial year 2023-24, with an approved budget of 680 million rupees, of which 340 million has been allocated for 51 schemes in Sukkur. However, no funds have been released yet for these schemes. Development schemes for Khairpur are in preparation, with an allocation of 560 million rupees.

Chief Minister was also informed about preparations for project in Ghotki, for which 380 million rupees have been allocated. Ongoing development schemes for financial year 2023-24 in Sukkur division are progressing, with focus on rehabilitation of roads and PHE schemes for drinking water.

Budget of 6271 million rupees will be spent on 388 road rehabilitation schemes in Sukkur and work on PHE schemes for drinking water will be completed this year. Additionally, 193.493 million rupees have been allocated for 191 water supply schemes, 142.83 million rupees for 262 drainage schemes and 83.328 million rupees for 199 water filtration plant schemes in Sukkur.

Divisional Commissioner Sukkur informed that 799.479 million rupees have been earmarked for three schemes for Sukkur Barrage and 499.478 million rupees have been released for this purpose. It was also mentioned that school buildings used as polling stations during general elections have been severely damaged, and an estimated 1,483.585 million rupees are needed for their repair. Contact has been made with Secretary GA, S&GAD for the provision of funds.

Published in The Daily National Courier, October, 25 2023

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