The Sindh High Court issued notices to the federal, provincial and city governments in a writ petition seeking ban on supply of contaminated water by any means.

The acute drinking water shortage and the failure of the door-to-door garbage collection scheme dominated the proceedings of the monthly meeting of the local Municipal Corporation (MC) today. The councillors demanded that residents should be provided adequate drinking water at least on alternate days. Expressing concern over the acute water scarcity in the capital most of the councillors demanded that concrete steps must be taken to provide relief to the people.

Though successive governments at the Centre and the State have adopted several ambitious schemes to supply safe drinking water to the people like

Nearly 15 lakh residents of Pimpri-Chinchwad can now look forward to getting clean drinking water. If the Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation is to be believed, citizens' long-cherished dream of getting "completely clean, pure and unpolluted drinking water' will come true in two years time.

Expressing concern over acute shortage of water in Sindh, Awami Tehrik chief Rasool Bux Palijo has said that even drinking water is not available in the province but water is still being released in Chashma-Jehlum and Taunsa-Panjnad link canals and Thal Canal. In a statement faxed to Dawn here on Sunday, he alleged that through the canals 40,000 cusecs of Sindh's share was being stolen. Not only this, but Tarbela Dam was being filled while Sindh was crying hoarse for water, he said.

Residents of different villages in Adenzai, Talash and Timergara localities of Lower Dir district have complained about the outbreak of waterborne diseases, especially typhoid, during the past 20 days. They alleged that health department was doing nothing to cope with the situation. Talking to Dawn on Monday they said that children and grown up people had been suffering from high fever with pain due to the said diseases. They said the number of victims was increasing with each passing day.

Sixteen percent of the filtered water supplied to Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT) is infected with bacteria, revealed a recent survey conducted by Pakistan Environmental Protection Agency (Pak EPA) over the filtration plants installed in Islamabad. According to the report, four out of the total 24 functional filtration plants in the federal Capital give out contaminated water even after filtration, which, as the report stated, was rich with bacteria besides other health-risking ingredients. The sectors where these plants are situated are I-9/1, I-10/1, G-9/2 and I-10/2.