Sindh’s prime minister Syed Murad Ali Shah said on Saturday that the PPP had the strength, capacity and authority to stop the Cholistan channel project, emphasizing that this power would be used if it became necessary.
Part of the green initiative of Pakistan, the Cholistan Canals project aims to water a total of 4.8 million acres (1.9 million hectares) of sterile land through the construction of six channels, two in Sindh, Baluchistan and Punjab.
Five of these channels will be built on the Indo River, while the sixth will build along the Sutlej River, supplying approximately 4,120 cusecs of water to water Cholistan’s desert in Punjab.
But what is being cheered as a change of play for Punjab has caused a fuss in Sindh, where interested parties fear that the project will deviate their water rights.
In statements to the media in the CM house on the subject, Shah said: “We are prepared to do everything possible to protect the rights of Sindh”, which described as the rights of the people of Pakistan.
“If our concerns are recognized, there should be no need for extreme measures,” he said.
He added that the voice of the PPP or that of the people of Sindh was heard and that is why the Punjab government had not used the RS45 billion assigned in the construction of the Cholistan channel project.
CM Shah said the opposition wanted the PPP to eliminate the federal government, but that the party would not pursue its agenda.
He argued that the work had not yet begun in the Cholistan channel project at the request of the Sindh government.
In addition, he noted that a small model was developed to exhibit possible investors.
The prime minister said the channels began upstream, but when his team visited the site in February, work was not carried out. “I told the team to visit a channel near the Indian border. When they went there, they discovered that no work was happening.”
Shah said that Pakistan faced the scarcity of acute water, noting that from 1999 to 2024, the Tarbela dam had only reached its maximum capacity for 17 days in 25 years, while the mangrove dam had filled its capacity for only four days.
“If we cannot fill our dams, how can we flow the new channels proposed by the federal government?”
The Cholistan channel project raises a threat not only for Sindh but also for the nation, and that was the reason why three provinces, Sindh, Baluchistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, had already opposed, said CM Shah.
He said that some people believed that Cholistan’s channel project had been built and that is why Sindh faced a shortage of water, while others thought that work in the scheme was quickly progressing.
“Actually, there is currently no work in progress; the media should help inform the public about the facts: the project has not yet begun,” he added.
He questioned the justification of the additional allocation of water to Punjab, emphasizing that Sindh’s resources were already under tension.
CM Shah dismissed the claims that President Asif Ali Zarari had approved the project, stating that the project approvals were located within the jurisdiction of adequate government agencies and required provincial consensus.
He clarified that the Sindh Assembly had approved a unanimous resolution against the project, with the PPP and the opposition parties united in its position resisting.
Shah asked Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif to reject the project unless an adequate consultation process was followed, reiterating that the final decision was with the federal government and the Common Interests Council (CCI), which has not yet been gathered on the subject.
He emphasized the need to call a CCI meeting to resolve this issue once and for all.
To a question, he pointed out that Punjab Prime Minister Maryam Nawaz, and the Army Chief had launched the green initiative of Pakistan in Punjab, not a new channel.
He pointed out that historically when there were no channels, flood channel systems allowed the cultivation of four million acres in Sindh compared to one million in Punjab.
CM Shah said that Cholistan’s channel project had created disturbances among people in three provinces with mass protests in Sindh.
