Ayaz Latif Palijo, the chief of Qaumi Awami Tehreek has said rulers are only interested to safeguard their own vested interests and have never shown their seriousness towards resolving the chronic issues of the common people and he asked the participants of the conference to protect their mines, minerals and other resources for their future generations.
Mr Palijo, who is also general secretary of Grand Democratic Alliance (GDA) addressing the party workers in Islamkot town on Thursday during the conference on Karoonjhar and Resources of Sindh conference said that it was the responsibility of every saner people to fight for the rights and to protect the resources from those casting evil eyes on them. .Mr Palijo during the speech and media talk lashed out at rulers for depriving the people of Thar of their basic rights including safe drinking water, education, healthcare facilities access to roads etc at the time when they get never tried of harping on theme that Thar will change Pakistan.
He said that both PPP and MQM were playing dirty and dangerous game again in Karachi and some other towns of Sindh for petty political interests adding he said it might be an international conspiracy to create lawlessness in the city. He also asked Prime Minister Imran to explain to the people of the country that corruption had increased in the country, which according to him, had brought the bad name for the country at the international level adding he asked Mr Khan to treat the all federating units of the country alike being a prime minister of the whole country. He said that Imran Khan should have himself clarified the serious allegations that corrupt practices were on the rise in the county at the time when the people were already getting sick of the rising prices of essential commodities and inflation. He said that the PTI government had so far totally disappointed the people of the country, who had pinned hopes on them to get rid of the previous ‘corrupt’ rulers. He said that it was also the responsibility of the federal bodies to ensure the judicious distribution of water among the provinces since Sindh had already suffered a lot due to severe water crises for the past many months. The agriculture sector has badly been affected throughout Sindh, he said.
Mr Palijo also lashed out at PPP rulers in Sindh for their alleged failure to ensure the availability of urea fertilisers for the farmers and growers of the provinces and said they were instead staging the drama through the demonstrations with tractors. He alleged that PPP rulers had already turned the entire province into ruins and were now playing dirty tricks to dupe the people to gain their sympathies ahead of the LB elections. Mr Palijo said that people of Sindh wanted a real change in their lifestyle and wanted to get rid of the corrupt rulers, who had made their lives miserable.
“The resources of Thar are fetching huge amounts of money for the rulers but the real owners are still facing abject poverty and backwardness” he added. He said that rulers had always cast their evil eyes on the precious granite stones of Karoonjhar hills but the brave and bold residents of Parkar region had so far thwarted their nefarious designs to take away the stones. He said that it was a very good decision of the people of the Parkar region to file petitions in the courts and to come on the roads to register their protest to save their Karoonjhar from the greedy contractors. He asked the high-ups of the Sindh government to ensure the complete protection and preservation of Karoonjhar hills and its religious, historical and heritage in the light of the recommendations of the geologists, experts and environmentalists. He said that it was the high time to resist the moves aimed at damaging the environment and ecology of the desert region adding he said that the impacts of climate change mattered much for the region and saner people had to stand for such critical issues.
The chief of QAT also highly lauded the efforts of Syed Karam Ali Shah, the judicial magistrate of Nagarparkar for completely banning the extracting of the granite from all points of Karoonjhar hills and issuing the notices to the extractors of China clay from different locations of Parkar region.” Mr Shah being a civil judge has made a history by taking a bold decision to save Karoonjhar hills from those, who were hell-bent to damage it to make money” he added. . “The people of Sindh in general and of Tharparkar in particular will never allow the contractors to cause more damage to the beautiful hills; he added and made it clear that rulers over the years had even failed to make proper legislation on important issues such as lands of Thar and its resources. He said that mining companies in Thar coalfields were only interested in extracting coal reserves and making money but were least bothered to even launch the welfare schemes under terms and conditions of CSR to provide the basic amenities of life to the people living around them.
He called upon the participants of the conference to effectively launch the protest movement to protect their resources and to press both executives of the mining companies and high-ups of Sindh government to stop creating at least the environmental hazards by carrying out a umber of the projects, according to him, which were damaging the fauna and flora of Sindh without knowing the sensitive aspects of the desert region. He said that the people of Thar had already suffered a lot due to incurring droughts and now despite being owners of huge coal reserves, granite, salt and China clay and other resources mainly due to the alleged indifference and callousness of the rulers. Mr Palijo strongly condemned the attitude of the executives and officials of the coal mining companies towards the local people and warned them to mend their ways while doing all that with the real owners of the ‘blcak gold’.
“The infants are dying due to the complications caused by malnutrition, the people of the entire desert region are forced to drink the contaminated and brackish water from the wells and having found no way out at the end of the tunnel, they are killing themselves” he added. Mr Palijo said that it was very shameful that the PPP government despite spending huge amounts on the waterworks including on the costly RO plants had failed to provide the safe drinking water to Tharis. ” The people of the desert district were deprived of safe drinking water after almost all costly plants had gone faulty due to the massive corrupt practices.” he added.
He demanded a probe into the malpractices committed by officials of the public health engineering department and companies in the schemes of waterworks carried out to provide the drinking water. Mr Palijo also lashed out at the local PPP lawmakers for their alleged criminal silence on the core issues of the region and the hegemony of the mining companies, who according to him, were treating Tharis as the children of lesser gods. Mr Palijo said that both PPP and MQM were again playing the dirty and dangerous game in Karachi which could prove very perilous for the peace of the province. “The miscreants affiliated with different parties are trying to push Karachi and other towns of Sindh towards the ethnic riots for their vested interests” he added and warned of dire serious consequences if they were not dealt with iron hands . Mr Palijo said that those trying to create such an environment should be brought to book since people of the province could not afford such politics of hate again, which would further cause more damages.
He said that the recent incidents was also a deep conspiracy to stop people of Sindh to settle in Karachi to earn their livelihood after they found the drought-like conditions in a number of the districts of the province. Shahnawaz Hingorjo, Mazhar Rahujo, Naheed Jogi, Anwar Nouhani, Abdul Manan, Prof Mohammad Hingorjo, Zahid Gul Otho and others also spoke on the occasion.
