Islamabad:
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Chief Minister Ali Amin Gandapur has described the Kalabagh dam as a project that is important to the state. He has called on the government to tackle the reservations that people have with regard to the project that both the KP and Sindh provinces have rejected in the past.
In a speech with the media after a party meeting in the KP house in Islamabad on Monday, Gandapur, who belongs to PTI, said the absence of large dams has led to massive destruction during the recent floods.
“We are afraid to even mention the names of some dams, but the Kalabagh dam is needed for the state. If there are objections to it, dialogue must be held to resolve them,” he added.
CM said they were ready to contribute their share to the construction of the dam and that other provinces should also play their role to make it possible. Gandapur said that delays in the building of dams have caused enormous damage, and now the provincial government is constructing dams on its own.
He noted that Pakistan has neither prepared sufficiently for natural disasters or built adequate dams.
“Last year we finished six dams. The Gomal Zam dam has ended, which reduced losses, and now we are constructing dams in various districts to mitigate problems,” he said.
CM said for Peshawar’s protection, the Jabba dam is built, while a protective wall is under construction in Budhni to protect the city from flooding.
When he spoke with reference to the loss of hundreds of life in buns, he said there had been a cloudburst in the district and the recent destruction in the area was not a result of deforestation.
“Cloudbursts occur due to atmospheric heat and can happen everywhere,” he said.
CM declared that the provincial government will build stone barriers, modeled after Switzerland, with yarn to block rocks carried by flood water.
The Kalabagh Dam is a suggested hydroelectric dam at the river Indus at Kalabagh in Mianwali Dis trict of Punjab. The dam, first proposed in the 1950s, has been intensely discussed along ethnic and re-gional lines for decades.
If constructed, the dam would generate 3,600 megawatt power. It is also proposed and promoted as a potential solution to the chronic flood problem and the related water crises in the country.
