New water accord with India urged by expert

LAHORE The Indus Water Treaty is an Indian water weapon against the country and it had been signed just to please the United States, said Engr Bashir A Malik, former chief technical advisor of United Nations and World Bank. TECH Club organised the seminar on Indian Water Aggression and Pakistans Position here Sunday. Pakistani rulers signed Indian Water Treaty (IWT) just to please a super power. The IWT is causing a direct loss to Punjab, he said, regretting that India has been constructing 190 dams whereas Pakistan has not been able to build even single major dam. He was of the view that if India stopped water according to Indus Water Treaty for one week, the agriculture in Pakistan would totally destroy. He highlighted the need to sign a new water treaty with India and said that the Pakistan government should start dialogue on the issue and India could be agreed to sign a new treaty in place of IWT. Speaking in the context of Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwas concern over the construction of Kalabagh Dam, he held that both the provinces would turn into desert and face severe future droughts if the KBD was not constructed. India is sponsoring anti-KBD groups in Khyber PK and Sindh, said Bashir A Malik. He also raised question on the viability Basha Dam Project, saying that there was no dam in existence in the world with the height similar to Bhasha Dam and it could be prove dangerous, he added. He said that Pakistan enjoyed less than one per cent of worlds water resources.

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