Sindh Chief Minister Qaim Ali Shah has directed the irrigation department, all the commissioners and local bodies to taken emergent measures to cop up the heavy rains expected from next Monday to Thursday which may turn into flash floods.
The CM issued the directives while presiding over a meeting held in the light of fresh weather forecast released on Saturday.
The chief secretary informed the meeting that heavy rains were expected from next Monday to Thursday. “The Met department has requested all the concerned departments to take necessary emergent measures because the heavy rains can turn into flash floods,” he said.
The chief minister said that he had visited major storm-water drains and found that illegal public settlements and encroachments had emerged inside and along the nullahs. “How these nullahs could be cleansed in such state of encroachments,” he questioned.
The chief minister directed Karachi Commissioner Shoaib Siddiqui to conduct a survey of illegal public settlements inside and along the storm water drains and suggest measure to remove them. “We are left with two options either to remove public settlements from nullahs or let the citizens be flooded. The clear and loud decision is to remove illegal encroachment from the nullah,” he said, adding that this must be done within 15 days.
