Last Day of Consultation on Bonded Labour

Labour Rights Advocates Call to declare 2010 as ‘The Year of Eradication of Bonded Labour’ KARACHI, April 10, 2010: Peasant workers, civil society activists, scholars, and farmers' rights advocates demanded the government on Saturday to declare 2010 as ‘The Year of Eradication of Bonded Labour’, and implement all the existing laws including the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act 1992 and the ILO Conventions related to the abolition of bonded labour and slavery. Speaking on the last day of the two-day Consultation on ‘Linkages between Land Rights, Food Security and Bondage’ organized by the Pakistan Institute of Labour Education and Research (PILER) at the PILER Centre, Karachi, civil society activists pointed out that under the Article-3 of the Constitution of Pakistan, it is the state’s responsibility to bring all kinds of exploitation to an end. They stressed that bonded labour is a “severe kind of exploitation.” They urged the Supreme Court (SC) to take notice of this grave violation of human rights and review the existing laws, including the Tenancy Act. “The Parliament should strike down all laws that are in conflict with the Constitution of Pakistan.” The second day of the two-day Consultation on ‘Linkages between Land Rights, Food Security and Bondage’ saw participation from a large number of human rights activists, labour rights representatives, academicians and civil society leaders. Executive Director PILER, Karamat Ali, Senior Economist Aly Ercelan, Civil Society Activist Adam Malik, Sindh Rural Partners Organisation Chairperson Zahida Detho, Lawyer Munaza Hashmi and Advocate Faisal Siddiqi chaired and participated in the panel discussions that covered different aspects of the issue of bonded labour and land rights. Speakers at the Consultation observed that the government is providing official land in both urban and rural areas to deserving people under various schemes such as the Goth Abad Scheme etc. However, most people in rural Sindh have not taken advantage of such schemes. “Insecurity of residence is the main cause of bonded labour in Sindh.” The Speakers demand that all the people, living on the lands for decades should be given the legal entitlements to that piece of land “to ensure their right to shelter and security.” The participants also condemned the government‘s proposed scheme for corporate farming under which the country’s agricultural land is planned to be provided to foreign firms with all the facilities for farming. Human rights and labour rights activists demanded that the land should be given to local landless peasants instead, particularly those who are freed from bonded labour through court orders. “Individuals who are freed from bonded labour usually are left with no source of income and livelihood options. It is important to ensure their access to land to facilitate their rehabilitation, and allow them an opportunity to stand on their own feet.” They urged the government to include the provision for the right to unionization in all sectors of the economy, especially the agricultural sector. “It is a practice world-over that all sectors of the labour force, barring the armed forces and the police service, are given the right to unionization. Successive Industrial Relations Acts have prevented a large segment of the country’s labour force, especially the agricultural sector and the informal sector from their due right to form unions and fight for their rights. The upcoming Industrial Relations Act should undo this provision and enable the labour force to access their rights without discrimination.” Sharing their experiences on the occasion, labour lawyers said that most of the bonded workers are released under the Habeas Corpus laws instead of the specific and relevant Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act 1992. Advocate Munaza Hashmi from Multan pointed out that senior lawyers and judges might be unaware of the existence of the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act 1992. She said that there are no flaws in the existing laws, but gaps in implementation are keeping a large part of the labour from accessing their rights. Senior lawyer Faisal Siddiqui said that he would soon file a petition in the Sindh High Court for the implementation of the Bonded Labour laws and the formation of District Vigilance Committees in those districts where the bonded labour issue is serious. A civil society activist from Hyderabad, Zulfiqar Shah said that more than 60 per cent of people in the Province of Sindh do not have their own residence. “Most of the peasants are living on the land of big landlords for decades. These landlords frequently use force to push labour to vacate their premises. Due to the absence of ownership rights, these workers are uprooted and rendered homeless.” Dr Christopher from Okara said that the peasants’ movement in Punjab has turned successful as the provincial government has agreed to provide land rights to all peasants of the Province. He said that the farmers have struggled for their land rights since 2000 and currently they are getting the entire crop from their agricultural production, which is an important success. Participants at the Consultation decided to lobby for declaring the year 2010 as ‘The Year of Eradication of Bonded Labour’. They pledged to work together to launch a formal movement to push for land reforms, abolishment of bonded labour and labour rights, and bring these issues to the agenda of the policymakers, the political forces and the legislators. “Democracy must be seen to be delivering on the basic rights of the people, and on bridging social divisions and disparities for it to earn people’s trust and support as a successful system for Pakistan.”

Bonded Labour

Land Reforms and Distribution of Agricultural Land Among Landless Peasants Demanded

KARACHI, Apr 09, 2010: Activists of trade unions, labour organizations and non-governmental organizations on Friday demanded to the introduction of land reforms and distribution of agricultural land among landless peasants to eradicate bondage and food insecurity from Pakistan. They identified big landholdings by feudal and landlessness as major causes of poverty and food insecurity in the country.

They were speaking on the first day of the two-day Consultation on ‘Linkages between Land Rights, Food Security and Bondage’ organized by the Pakistan Institute of Labour Education and Research (PILER) at the PILER Centre, Karachi. Chairman Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum (PFF) Mohammad Ali Shah, Senior Economist Dr Shahida Wizarat, labour rights leader Mannu Bheel, Pakistan Food Security Coalition Representative Jabbar Bhatti, Executive Director PILER Karamat Ali, Joint Director of PILER Zulfiqar Shah, Dr. Ghulam Haider Malookani of Green Rural Development Organization, Ramazan Memon of Bhandar Hari Sangant and others spoke at the day-long session.

Speaking on the occasion, PILER Executive Director Karamat Ali said people of this country are suffering at the hands of poverty and food insecurity due to the lack of a public distribution system. He recalled that the ration system was effectively providing essential food items to all citizens at affordable prices, but the government abolished this system. “This system is still being effectively practised in India,” he said adding that instead Pakistan government has introduced a faulty system of providing essential items through Utility Stores, which has failed to benefit a major section of the population.

Mr. Ali said that though the colonial system has been condemned, there were many good features of the governance that the colonial rulers introduced, which were abolished after the independence. “During British rule, whoever was cultivating the agricultural land was the owner of the land. Zamindars or feudal were only collecting a portion on behalf of the government. However, following independence, successive governments in Pakistan did not provide land to the poor people. Feudal became stronger, expanding their control over a majority of agricultural land.”

Chairman of Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum (PFF) Mohammad Ali Shah said that without political struggle we cannot achieve food security. “Uneven and unjustified distribution of resources are creating food insecurity.” He said that it is the duty of the state to facilitate the provision of food to its citizens. “We have to move from food security to food sovereignty,” he added.

He observed that feudalism continues to act as an obstacle to the development of the country. “Without the abolition of this system, we cannot achieve food security,” Shah emphasized that land reforms are the key to poverty eradication. “If land reforms are implemented in a systematic and judicious manner, every citizen will have enough land to overcome poverty.” Shah also stressed that a formal movement along the lines of a political movement, to pursue land reforms is critical to achieving the objective of a just and even distribution of land.

Senior Economist Dr. Shahida Wizarat presented a study in progress on food security in Pakistan. She observed that rising inflation that is eroding real wages, water shortage, weak planning and institutional set-up linked to the production and marketing of agricultural products, and pressure from international financial institutions for unconstructive intervention in the agricultural sector have resulted in serious challenges in food security and access to food for the poor. She said that the government is planning to provide uncultivable land to big corporations, which would further deprive the poor peasants of their landholdings.

The other participants of the consultation meeting, who are mainly working for bonded labour pointed out that most of the rights-based organizations are focusing on the release of bonded peasants. However, little effort is being made for their rehabilitation or welfare.

The two-day long consultation on ‘Linkages between Land Rights, Food Security and Bondage’ shall continue till April 10, 2010. 

There's more to Life than Money: Explore Yourself, Connect with Society, and Find Happiness

Happiness

There's more to Life than Money: Explore Yourself, Connect with Society, and Find Happiness

Convocation address of Dr Sandeep Pandey, who was the Chief Guest, at Indian Institute of Management (IIM-C) Kolkata
Dear friends, as you complete yet another milestone in your academic career and prepare to embark on a new professional path, I would like to offer you hearty congratulations and best wishes. Your Institute’s environment and professors at IIM Kolkata must have provided you with both the managerial skills and ethical values necessary to lead a life that will be professionally, socially and spiritually satisfying. However, the inputs imbibed here are only the starting point, and you will have to constantly question, assess and evolve your values and actions as you begin living in real society. While I hope that you will take care of your professional skills, I want to share my thoughts with you about the challenges you will face in the social and spiritual aspects, the implication they will have for your professional choices, and how you could respond to them.
I will organize my thoughts by responding to some fundamental questions that arise in everyone’s mind:
(i) Who we are?
(ii) How can we become happy and satisfied individually?
(iii) What is the implication of seeking happiness for our professional choices and decisions? Read more


Who we are?
To put it simplistically, we are social beings shaped by the history of nature and life, and integrated in the web of nature, society and economy. To realize this we have to only look at three facts – (a) what scientists have understood about the evolution of life and human society, (b) how economies work, and (c) what our present living experience says.

Living species have evolved over hundreds of millions of years through a natural process of collective adaptation to environmental changes. While environmental changes are highly random, the collective adaptation response of a population of a species at any point of time is partly random too. The collective response also depends on the capabilities of that species. A species’ capabilities themselves have been shaped by historical pathways of environmental changes and responses of that and other species. Even the evolution of humans as groups and societies in the past tens of thousands of years is the story of how, under certain fortuitous circumstances, certain collective decisions were taken. To sum up, the set of phenomenal intellectual, psychological, cultural and physical capabilities that each one of us possesses as individuals today is a product of collective decisions and actions taken in the past by populations of so many human societies and other species as responses to random environmental changes. And this is equally true of the set of unique capabilities that every species possesses.

Then, look at how the economies work. The regulated supply of money combined with the rules by which the market values various activities, determines how the money flows, from whom and to whom. Every individual is a consumer and a labourer. As a labourer, he/she adds a certain value to the making of certain products or services. How much material wealth he/she gains depends on how much the markets value his/her skills relative to others’ skills. Hence some people end up accumulating material wealth at a rate higher than others, while some people at the other extreme may even end up being pauperized. The rules by which an economic governance structure values various skills and distributes material wealth among different sections of society are heavily influenced by who has the say in designing those rules. That is, who has greater lobbying power in the political structure. A less democratic political and economic structure will distribute wealth less equitably than a more democratic one.

Finally, look at our current living experience. Ask yourself and others a question, “What, in your experience, gives you lasting happiness?” While there will be disagreement on whether money or private ownership of property gives true happiness, there will be wide agreement on certain responses. Forming and sustaining mutually warm and friendly relations with others makes each one of us happy. In addition, we also feel happier if we have greater freedom to express and exercise our choices at the levels of relations with other individuals as well as relations with macro structures like the state and market. To sum up, mutually satisfying and harmonious relations at the micro level with our friends and at the macro level with the political and economic governing structures will make us happy. The condition of ‘mutuality’ is crucial as it demands that we, in order to freely exercise choices, do not harm others. It’s like saying that I will be happy in a relationship with a friend only if my friend is happy too. Extend this argument to a larger society and it becomes obvious that we will be happier if all our co-citizens are happy too.

At the micro level of individual relations, this demands that we become compassionate and sensitive towards others. At the macro level of relations with political and economic structures, this demands that the structures are democratic, i.e. they provide enough space to every individual and community to express and exercise its concerns and choices irrespective of how underprivileged or privileged it is.

How can we become happy and satisfied individually?
Therefore learning from our understanding of the evolution of life, how economies work, and from our own living experience tells us that we are social beings. And that we will be happy and satisfied if we become more compassionate towards our people, other species and the rest of nature, and design political and economic governance structures that are more democratic.

Please note that money is just one of the means to achieve this end. Thus, our real challenge as economically privileged citizens is to influence the flow of money and materials in the economy so that our underprivileged co-citizens can gain as much access to resources and opportunities as we have. So that they too can lead a life of dignity.

If we work towards accumulating wealth mainly for our immediate family and organization, we will most likely ignore the impact of our actions on the rest of society and nature. In an interconnected world, the result will be what we are witnessing already. Resources are being grabbed by a few corporations and individuals. The market is adding monetary value for the few and taking it away from the others. Most privileged individuals are busy trying to make more money and accumulate more material assets for themselves.

Psychological disorders are increasing proportionately. Modernization is progressing at a fast pace. Big-time corruption, not just in government but also in the corporate world, is on the rise. At the same time, tribals are being displaced from the forests in order to clear land for mining companies. Some tribals are, in turn, supporting Maoists in a violent fight against the state’s armed forces. Small farmers and families are being displaced without proper rehabilitation to clear lands and rivers for SEZs, big dams and industries. The urban poor is being thrown out in order to erect shopping malls, posh offices and residential complexes. Crimes in cities are on the rise. Local communities everywhere are protesting at the snatching away of public resources like land, water and forests on which their survival depends. They are protesting at the helplessness of not having the right to exercise choices that will help them come out of poverty and lead a life of dignity. Simultaneously, severe environmental problems, both local pollution of air, water and soil, and global problems like climate change and ozone layer depletion, threaten our well-being.

We would be foolish to not see the obvious correlations between these trends.

The problem needs to be solved at both the macro and the micro levels. At the macro level, structures of political and economic governance need to be made more democratic and humane. Take the example of GDP which we use as the dominant measure of the economic prosperity of a nation. There are so many problems with this. One, it does not capture non-materialistic aspects of happiness, like living in harmonious relations with other people and the rest of nature. Two, GDP and its growth rate are only ‘average’ measures of economic well-being. They do not even reflect the overall economic status of the people living in a country. Every engineering and management school teaches that the performance of a population must be measured by both the average and the variation. Ignoring variation will give only partial and probably incorrect pictures of a phenomenon. If we look at the frequency distribution of household income in India it will become clear that it is highly skewed, with the majority of people falling in the very low-income range and the minority occupying the long high-income tail. These two sets of populations are growing at vastly different rates. The growth rate of income of the majority of poor people is less than even the rate of inflation, implying their condition is actually worsening. This is the set that consists of landless people, small farmers, tribals, Dalits, street vendors, daily wage labourers and urban slum dwellers.

What is the implication for our professional choices and decisions?

As individuals living in an inter-connected web of nature, society and economy, what therefore can we do professionally so that we simultaneously attain happiness and satisfaction? This is the question I want each one of you to ask yourself.

Whatever choices you make in your profession, whatever actions you take, what work you do and how you earn your income, how you allocate your time, how you participate in your immediate surroundings and community and in the larger society and economy..   All these are the questions that you must seek answers to. Your analysis and response to these questions will determine how much happiness you will attain and how much meaning you will find in life.

I do hope that you will build harmonious relations with your friends, relatives, colleagues and strangers – relations that will be a source of happiness to you and to others. I also hope that you will show a lot of compassion towards your underprivileged co-citizens and strive to build more democratic structures of polity and economy.

I sincerely wish you all a very satisfying life ahead. May you become prosperous, contribute to others’ prosperity, and in the process, derive lasting happiness – both socially and spiritually.

Rahul Pandey

(The author is a former faculty member of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Bombay and the Indian Institute of Management (IIM) Lucknow. He is currently a founding member of a start-up venture that develops mathematical models for planning and policy analysis. He can be contacted at rahulanjula@gmail.com)

[Sandeep Pandey is a Ramon Magsaysay Awardee (2002) for emergent leadership, a member of the National Presidium, People's Politics Front (PPF), heads the National Alliance of People's Movements (NAPM) and did his PhD from the University of California, Berkeley, USA. He taught at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kanpur before devoting his life to strengthening people's movements in the early 1990s. He can be contacted at: ashaashram@yahoo.com. Website: www.citizen-news.org]

Chang

 

In Sindhi, the Jaw harp (or Jews' harp) is called Changu (چنگُ). In Sindhi music, it can be an accompaniment or the main instrument. 

Throughout Europe, Asia and the Pacific, except Australia, no pre-Columbian traces have been discovered in the Americas. Until introduced as a trade item by Europeans, none were found on the African continent. It is found everywhere in Russia. Bamboo and wooden lamellate types are found in the Pacific, SE Asia and China except in Northern China (where the classical form of the Jew's Harp was an iron idioglot lamellate type). Through European colonization, the bow-shaped metal Jew's Harp was introduced into the Americas, Africa and Australia mainly by the Dutch and English for North America. In Siberia and Mongolia, the Jew's Harp was used to both induce trance and to heal the sick. Dr. Franz Anton Mesmer is said to have used the Jew's Harp therapeutically in psychotherapy.

Note: The above content has been taken from Blog Chagatai Khan: http://chagataikhan.blogspot.com/2009/10/folk-artists-of-sindh-rajasthan-playing.html (Courtesy Aamir Mughal)

Hasan Brohi 

(Hasan Brohi is a very good amateur Chang player. He is working as Security Guard at PILER Centre Karachi )

Masttan te kehri mayyar

By Shujauddin Qureshi

Masttan te kehri mayyar [a Sindhi phrase, which means there is no censure on devotees (I cannot find the exact translation of the word Mast)].

This is true in the case of Muharram Shah, who has left his career, his family and worldly life to serve nothing. “This is my Ishq,” he said multiple times during a spontaneous interview with him.

Let me clear first that religiously I am very liberal and I don’t have any negativity toward the Muslim Shia sect, so please excuse my Shia friends if I have written something against your belief. Muharram is an extreme devotee of Shia and he said many things during the interview which are beyond human comprehension. He said he organizes ‘Aag Matam’ (mourning on fire) every year on the occasion of the annual Urs of Qalandar Lal Shahbaz in Muslim month of Shabaan.

Muharram has encroached on a piece of land (about an acre) at the entry point in Lal Bagh (an old park linked with Sufi saint Hazrat Qalandar Lal Shahbaz) in Sehwan. Muharram himself accepted the fact of encroachment without any hesitation. He said he was put behind the bars for some period due to encroachment as this land actually belongs to the provincial Auqaf department. “Auqat people removed us, from this place, uprooted our plants and quarrelled us many times, but now they are saying nothing to us,” he said.

I was attracted to that place by chance. I, along with many other friends (mostly belonging to civil society organizations and media) was going to Shah Hassan village to see the degradation of Manchhar lake on Saturday, March 27, 2010. Friends of Indus Forum had arranged that visit in collaboration with other civil society organizations like Thardeep Rural Development Programme and Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum (PFF). We took a short break from the journey as some other friends had to join us at that point.

I saw a black Alam (that was a quite common thing at such places), a boat covered with black cloth and a framed photo of an old man along with two lions and some small black flags. A single-room house was also on one side. The Altar (flag, boat, photo, lamp and many other things), surrounded by saplings of fruit trees was quite unusual, at least for me. A youth clad in black robe-like Shalwar Kameez, with a thick black beard and long hair, welcomed me as I reached the Altar. 

While shaking hands, the first thought came into my mind that he would ask for some donations. So to avoid such demands, I used my old journalist tool by firing a volley of questions at him, to which he replied with a beautiful smile. I told him about our purpose to visit the place.

He might have read my mind, so he said he is blessed by Allah as he can feast on hundreds of people in a single sitting. My obvious first question was from where he gets the money. “People donate and give me money, grains and other eatables without any asking.” A box of donations is also part of his sacred Altar.

His name was Muharram Shah and he said he serves this place by putting a small garden around the Alam (flag).

My next question was about the purpose of putting the boat near the flag. “It is a miraculous boat.” His Guru, Sayed Shahanshah, had driven (sailed) that boat on dry land and covered a two to three-kilometre distance while carrying 14 people in the boat. It had also returned to the starting place, an Imambargah. This happened in Ranipur and it was a famous incident in that area as many people can testify it, he said. Muharram said he was also in the boat. “Why your father sailed the boat on dry land?” I asked. The people of the area were not allowing his Murshid to do Matam (mourning) of Hazrat Imama Hussain in the village near Ranipur (Khairpur district). I asked “who is Sayed Shahanshah? Is he alive?” Yes, he replied, he is alive and was here a few days back. He is a living saint. His age is about 50. “Is he your real father?” I asked. “No. he is actually my uncle, but a spiritual father therefore I call him my father.” He has his real two sons.

“Baba has done a lot of miracles,” he claimed. “For example,” I immediately asked. “Once a blind person came and my father asked me to put red chillies powder in his eyes. When I put chillies powder in his eyes, his vision is restored.” I was about to fall on the ground insensately. By controlling myself I further enquired, “what else?” Muharram continued: “His other miracle was that once a group of devotees of Qalandar came in many buses to this place and asked for food. It was 3 am in the night. Baba asked us to prepare bread and ordered me to climb the tree of “babbur” (he showed me a nearby tree). I climbed up and started shaking a branch and ripe mangoes started dropping, which we collected and all of us ate.” This time I was in my senses. I gave him time to tell more. He pointed towards a mango sapling near the boat. “I have asked Baba that I need mangoes on this plant this year. Look it has started giving fruits,” he showed me small buds, which he called mangoes on the small plant. I tried to take pictures of those mangoes, but my camera was not so efficient to take photos so closely.

 

We were in the discussion, and suddenly another person with a grey beard appeared from somewhere and tried to add more to our discussion about the miracles of Baba. “I have myself witnessed many miracles of Baba and Muharram Shah,” he claimed. I asked him to introduce himself. He said he is Mureed (devotee) of Muharram Shah and comes to this place quite often, to be precisely every fortnight for two or three nights to serve him. That was his third day of stay at the holy place. Zameer Lanjwani was his name. He said he does not do anything. “I am a Sailani (roaming) Faqeer.” He belongs to Tando Masti village of Khairpur district but presently lives in Bhit Shah. He claimed he has his own house in Bhit Shah, which he has donated to his Murshid.

“Are you married?” I asked Lanjwani. “No, but I want to,” he said straightforwardly. Then what is the impediment in it, I asked? “I don’t have any job.” He had never studied in any school and cannot confirm his age. He said he is around 30 years old. Lanjwani said he had tried to get a government job, and for that purpose he has got prepared fake certificates of Matric, but he has not succeeded. He made those confessions by saying he cannot hide anything from me. Thanks for his confidence in me. 

 (I am not showing my cell phone, but was recording his voice on my cell phone)

“Why don’t you ask your Murshid for a job?” I asked. Instead, he asked me to help him get a job. I was really flabbergasted. I made him clear that I am not a politician or Wedera or an influential person to help him find a government job. Muharram said he had got a government job in the health department in Kandiaro. He also learned computers and also did a job in Nawabshah. But let all those worldly things.

My curiosity did not subside. I asked Muharram what else miracle has his Guru made so far. "A lot " was his pet answer to all my questions of similar nature. His list was really quite long. “Baba once went to Balochistan to do Azadari (mourning of Hazrat Imam Hussain) at Sheinh Lakk (Lion Pass) and people brought a person without legs. With a sign of hand, the lame got both of his legs. Since then people in that area particularly those who go to Lahoot La Makaan can testify to it. Now many people have become his devotees in Balochistan.” It was really difficult for me to believe.

As the interview continued, my friends signalled to come into the van to leave for our destination, so I asked the last couple of questions to Muharram. Although I wanted to say why are you wasting your life, I just asked: “Why don’t you get married and make a family?” “I have learned from the worldly experiences that there is honour in Faqeeri (devotion), so I have adopted this life.” He put me in confusion when he said if you control sexual drives, don’t say any wrong from your mouth and keep yourself away from vices, God opens His doors for you,” he said. “There is a lot of honour in this world,” He added. He concluded by saying that his aim in life is to plant fruit trees in Lal Bagh as they were available at the time of Hazrat Qalandar Lal Shahbaz.

A lot of questions still remained unanswered in my mind but I had to take permission to leave from this young Guru of Sehwan.

The Last of the Mohanas

The Last of the Mohanas

By Mr Shujaudin Qureshi, 

The Reuters - IUCN Media Award - 1999 

Pakistan Published in "Newsline", Pakistan, June 1999 

 The age-old lifestyle of the Mohanas is threatened by the polluted waters of the RBOD. Once a beautiful lake with daffodils and lotus flowers attracting colourful migratory fowl from the chilly Siberian plateau, Manchhar lake, the habitat of the Mohanas, has been turned into a poisonous cesspool by the discharge of toxic waste from the Right Bank Outfall Drain (RBOD). 

The once-blue water of the lake has turned into greenish filth, and it has become unfit for human consumption. Under the RBOD project, sewerage water and drainage, drawn from water-logged and salinity-hit areas of the upper parts of the country, mixed with chemicals and fertilisers from rice cultivation in upper Sindh is being disposed of in the lake through the Main Nara Valley (MNV) drain. 

The fishermen, known as Mohanas, who has lived in houseboats on Manchhar lake since time immemorial, are now facing starvation and disease due to this environmental degradation which is depleting fish stock and posing a serious health hazard. Manchhar, Pakistan's largest freshwater natural lake, is located in the district Dadu, about 300 kilometres northwest of Karachi in the Kirthar valley.

With riverine forests on the southeast side and the river Indus on the east, the picturesque lake has special significance in the history of Sindh. Its Mohanas is said to be the true progeny of the people of Moenjodaro. "The recorded catch of the lake was once about 2,300 tons per annum, but it now stands at barely 300 to 400 tons per year," says Ghulam Qadir Rodhnani, a local landlord and fish trader.

"Poisonous water is killing our fish and us," says Yar Muhammad Mallah, 65 one of the Mohanas of Manchhar. Fishing is the only source of income for the Mohanas. The decline in the catch has brought many families to the point of starvation. "We live our entire life on the lake and we know techniques of catching freshwater fish. Deep sea fishing is not possible for us," says Yar Muhammad. Hundreds of Mohana families have been forced to migrate to other wetlands in search of a living. 

Some have migrated to lakes in Thatta, Badin and Sanghar in recent years and ~ others have gone as far away as Mianwali in which fishermen carry their boats with them and relatives behind. To add to their woes; the Mohanas of Manchaar are now compelled to buy drinking water from the nearby town of Bubak on payment because the lake's water is too polluted to use for drinking or cooking meals. "We buy 20 litres of drinking water for five rupees," says Muhammad Umer Mallah. Those who cannot afford to purchase water are forced to use the toxic lake water, and this has resulted in the outbreak of a number of water-borne diseases. "Water polluted with chemical wastes can affect the nervous system and disturb the hormonal balance in the body," says Dr. Asad Ali Abro, WHO representative in Sindh. 

He says the residues of fertilisers and chemicals in the water could also be carcinogenic. There is no basic health facility at the lake. Scabies, other skin diseases, tuberculosis, polio, cholera, eye infections and stomach infections are common among the lake dwellers. Maternal and infant mortality are high as there are no trained medical attendants. The local dais (midwives) cannot handle complicated cases, and many women lose their lives before they can reach a medical facility. 

There is a medical dispensary on the other side of the protective bund (embankment) of the lake, but it has no doctor, medicines or even first aid materials. "We had a good doctor some time ago but after the cancellation of the contracts of over 1,700 doctors by the Sin& government, he too has gone`" says Ghulam Qadir Rodhnani. Now there is just a compounder who makes occasional visits to an ill-stocked dispensary.

 A local NGO, the Samaj Sudhar Tehrik (SST), headed by Mumtaz Rashidi, runs a family health project focussing on Manchhar Lake in collaboration with the United Nations Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA). "We provide medical facilities through our mobile teams," says Ghulam Haider Birhamani, project director SST. Some school buildings have been set up by the government in areas around Manchhar lake but without any teachers or other facilities. 

"The only school in our village was closed because its teacher was transferred on political grounds," says Rodhnani. Since then, no substitute has been provided. The Sindh Education Foundation had planned to set up floating schools in the lake and a study was conducted in this regard, but no progress has been made. In any case, each Mohana household comprises about eight to 15 members, all of whom, including the children, have to earn to ensure the family's survival. The lack of educational facilities in the area also discourages parents from sending their children to school. 

Manchhar lake is located on the international route of migratory birds. Being the largest reservoir and the first wetland on the route of the birds, it attracted birds in the thousands every year. Most of these migratory birds spent the entire winter season in these waters. Species like shovellers, teals, tufted duck, little ringed plover, wood sandpipers, waders, wagtails, nightingales, parakeets, storks, ducks and a host of local species added colour and life to the beauty of the lake. About 20,000 to 30,000 colourful birds visited the lake annually, but pollution has caused a reduction in the number of visiting birds. 

"Due to poisonous waters and the low stock of fish in the lake, only a few birds visited us this year," says fisherman, Hot Khan, 70. "The number of birds has been drastically reduced in recent years and they now have a shorter stay," confirms Jehangir Durrani, conservator (Wetlands), World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) Karachi. He says that pollution has disturbed the big diversity of Manchhar lake. 

"You cannot see vegetation for hundreds of metres at the point where pollution arises in the lake from the MNV." Fishermen catch some of these birds and sell them dead or alive in the local market. "It is like a bonus for us in the winter," says Ghulam Hussain Mirani. Although some species of birds are protected under local laws, they are purchased at a high price by the local influentials for their own consumption. Manchhar's Mohanas have distinguished themselves in producing eatables and consumer items from the reeds and lotus plants of the lake. They also market by-products of flora. 

The Mohanas make mats of lotus reeds or pan. Sindhi families use these mats for bedding and in their sitting rooms for floor covering. In most mosques in rural Sindh, they are still used as prayer mats. The lotus products pan and deer were sought-after items in rural as well as urban areas. Its fruits (pabbun, kum), roots (bih), stems (konni) and other products like pabora and boorani had a good market in the towns of Sindh as people ate them raw or cooked them to make a flavourful dish. But since the pollution of the lake, most of these products have disappeared. "I haven't seen pabbun for many years," says Umer Mallah. Before the MNV began to discharge RBOD effluents into the lake some five years ago, the Mohanas were well off. 

On average, each family saved more than 200 rupees a day after daily expenses. The fishermen were happy and prosperous. "It was like Dubai for us," says one of the Mohanas. "Now we are unable to pay even the loan instalments on our boats on time every month," says Yar Muhammad Mallah. These loans were taken from a WHO project for the purchase and repair of the fishermen's boats. 

 The MNV drain, charged with rain water drawn from the nearby Kirthar hill torrents, was once a source of fresh water for the lake. It also carried fresh water from the Dadu Canal and Rice Canal in the Sukkur barrage command area. Rain torrents, locally called nai, catch water from the Kirthar hills and from the Indus river when it is in spate in summer. Increased water levels push water through inundation-type feeder channels, called Aral and Dunster, into the lake. 

But for many years now the Indus has not been in high flood and it is in spate for only two or three months in the summer. Fresh water sources have thus become scarce, while highly polluted water is dumped into the drain from RBOD. The human effluent of a population of over 50,000 also adds to the pollution of the lake, but Dr. Pervaiz Naim, the director, of IUCN, says that this excretion clears up through a natural process and does not harm the flora and fauna of the lake in the same way as the chemicals and fertiliser residue found in the MNV water. 

 The MNV carries about 2,100 cusecs of effluent water with a salinity ratio of over 5,000 particles per million (ppm) to Manchhar lake, while WHO's allowed maximum safety level of water for human consumption is only 640 ppm. Members of the Mohana community have preserved their traditional lifestyle for centuries. They spend their entire life on boats known as teens or Galya. The boat is a complete home with bedrooms, sitting places, a kitchen, furniture and utensils. 

The Mohanas use small boats called batelo for fishing in the lake. They also use the batelo to reach the embankments for shopping or selling the catch. "We use the batelo as a mode of conveyance, like a ferry," says Sultan Ahmed Mallah. An engine is fitted to each batelo, whereas the beri is rowed with the help of oars. "Wherever we find a suitable place, we station our beri. Normally our villages are formed near dense reeds in the water because these afford natural cover. Our families perform daily chores on the boats, including bathing and attending to the call of nature," says Ghulam Mustafa Mirani. These boats are their only property. If a youth marries, his parents make a new teen for their son and if the parents are not well off, the newly-married couple live on the same boat. In this case, a separate area is created for the new couple. 

 A beri is nominally divided into three parts. The prow is used as a kitchen, where a specially designed clay stove is used for cooking. It is also used for taking baths, having chats in the evening or washing clothes. The cabin or central part of the boat is used as a bed-cum-living room. A cradle for children, utensils arranged on the racks, a straw mat on the ground and beds are a common sight in this section of the boat and up to 10 people can easily sleep in its cabin. In the summer, the family sleeps on the roof of the cabin "In the case of a joint family, a couple may sleep on the roof of the beri," says Mirani. 

 The stem or rear part of the boat is used as a storehouse for keeping the rudder and steering oar. Five to 10 teens form a village, called doondi, in the waters, with about six to 10 family members living in each beri. There are some floating shops in the lake where the Mohanas stock items of daily use. There is also a group among the Mohanas that dwells on open grounds (island-like patches of land appearing in the lake) in huts, made from straw. They keep cattle and livestock with them in the huts. 

"When the water level rises and the islands disappear in the waters, we move to our beris," says Mirani. Their straw huts are folded and kept on the roof of the beri. The womenfolk of the Mohanas fully take part in fishing with their mates, besides doing other family chores. Fish is the staple diet of the Mohanas, who know how to use it in different ways. 

"We cook meat or vegetables on big occasions like Eid or marriages," says Sultan Ahmed Mallah. Historian M.H. Panhwar termed the Mohanas the true descendants of the people of Moenjodaro. His views are supported by other historians like Taj Sahrai and Shaikh Khurshid Hasan, former director general of the federal department of archaeology. Shaikh Khurshid Hassan states in a report: "As boatmen and fishermen, the Mohanas have remained in touch with all the invaders of the Indus Valley such as the Aryans, Persians, Greeks, Scythians, White Huns, Muslims and British from time to time, but none except the Muslims have influenced their way of life and culture.'? Taj Muhammad Sahrai writes in Lake Manchhar- The Most Ancient Seat of Sindhu Cultures. "Lake Manchhar was known to the Persians and the Greeks in prehistoric times." 

 The Mohanas of Manchhar have made the lake's waters their habitat for thousands of years, but this ancient culture is now in peril. They are suffering from starvation and death due to the government's apathy and ill-planning. WAPDA officials show little interest in saving Manchhar's Mohanas the lake itself, as well as the environment of the river Indus. 

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 "An emergency plan should be chalked out for the clean up of Manchhar" Brigadier (retd.) Akhtar Zamin, Director General, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Sindh. 

Q: What steps have been taken by EPA Sindh to control pollution in Manchhar lake? 

 A: Pollution in Manchhar, which is Asia's largest lake, is a cause of concern for us and the people of Sindh. We took the initiative to study the extent of pollution in the lake. I, along with an EPA team, visited the lake. Begum Mumtaz Rashidi, who is running an NGO in that area, also cooperated and guided us. Our team of experts were also accompanied by the vice chancellor of the Mehran University of Engineering and Technology, Jamshoro. We personally reviewed the situation and organised a seminar in collaboration with Mehran University to highlight the pollution issue in Manchhar lake. We also collected samples of water to ascertain the pollution level. We have also asked the Sindh government and WAPDA to take immediate steps to stop the drainage of salinity into the late to save the flora, fauna and human life. We have proposed a long-term plan for the rehabilitation of the lake because the lake and its people should be saved from total destruction. An emergency plan should be chalked out for the cleanup of Manchhar. 

 Q: What were your observations during the visit? 

 A: The situation in and around the lake is very serious. Due to the pollution, fish catch has reduced and people are facing difficulties in getting water for drinking. Samples taken from Manchhar lake show that the salinity was over 3,000 mg/litre for most of the samples, against the desirable limit of 500 mg/litre for the fisheries and 1,000 mg/litre for drinking purposes. 

Q: To what extent has pollution affected the environment of the lake? 

 A: A entire lake has become saline and the salinity level is increasing day by day. Besides affecting fish, pollution has caused a reduction in the number of visiting waterfowl that stay on the lake every winter. Tourism has also been affected and fishermen are migrating to other areas. The pollution is also affecting the surrounding fertile agricultural lands which are irrigated by the lake water, and this has reduced crop production and rendered thousands of people jobless. 

 Q: What role is the EPA playing to save the lake? 

 A: The EPA has taken up the issue with the government. We believe that the permanent solution is the immediate completion of the Indus Link. We have also asked the government to consider the option of disposing of the RBOD effluent into LBOD through a siphon, crossing the river. 

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Development or Destruction? 

 The Right Bank Outfall Drain (RBOD) is a long-term project to drain out sewerage and waste from towns and agricultural lands on the right bank of the river Indus. Under the Right Bank Master Plan, developed with the assistance of the Overseas Development Agency, WAPDA has undertaken some drainage works on a priority basis and these include the construction of a link canal that would dispose of the effluent from the RBOD into the river Indus. Presently, this effluent is disposed into Manchhar lake through the Main Nara Valley (MNV) drain. 

The completion of the 24-km-long Indus Link would end the degradation of Manchhar but will pose problems of its own. Environmentalists fear that it would endanger human life and the agricultural system and environment in and around the Kotri barrage. The proposed link would connect the MNV drain with the river Indus near Bhan Saeedabad town in the Sehwan subdivision of Dadu district. This will disturb the bio-diversity of the river besides posing a threat to human life and irrigation systems in lower Sindh. The effluent discharged into Manchhar lake has already affected its aquatic life. Saline water has also destroyed the fertile agricultural lands of the Dadu district. 

"When WAPDA started disposing RBOD effluent into Manchhar, it claimed that the drain would not affect it," says Nisar Effendi, Chairman of the Sindh Abadgars Association. No environmental impact assessment study was conducted before starting the project. A study conducted by M/s. Mott MacDonald suggested three alternatives for the Indus Link. 

The first option (RBOD 1), upstream of Sehwan, was rejected by WAPDA, and the second option, prepared by NESPAK in late 1994 (RBOD 2), was eventually chosen. Cities and towns on both sides of the river, right from Attock to Hyderabad and Shahbandar, are already disposing of their untreated municipal waste into the Indus. This sewerage contains heavy metals discharged from industries. 

In such a situation, further disposal of effluent through the RBOD would only add to the pollution level of the river. "If disposed into the river, the effluent will damage the canal system of Kotri Barrage," says Qamar-uz-Zaman Shah, Chairman, of the Sindh Chamber of Agriculture. Hyderabad takes its drinking water directly from the Indus, whereas some of Karachi's drinking water is also drawn from Indus sources. "This virtually toxic water will pose a great danger to the people of Hyderabad and Karachi," says Nisar Effendi. During the approval of a PC-1 for RBOD-2, the Sindh government has shown some concern regarding the disposal of the drainage effluent into the river. 

But WAPDA overrode these objections and invited tenders for the first contract of the Indus Link (IL-1) in January 1995. Then Sindh Chief Minster, Syed Abdullah Shah, fearing for the safety of his agricultural lands, expressed his apprehensions about the link and the Sindh government suggested a study on the third option, RBOD-3, which would bring the outfall downstream of Sehwan. The local people and several influential politicians raised a hue and cry over this option and the federal government then formed a committee to deal with it but failed to resolve the issue. Eventually, WAPDA got the approval of then Prime Minister, Benazir Bhutto, who was keen on completing the project and the federal government decided to begin construction of RBOD-2. Experts claim that RBOD-2 would affect Sehwan the most because the town's drinking water comes directly from the Indus. The third option, RBOD-3, bypasses Sehwan and disposes effluent into the Indus downstream. "We want WAPDA to consider the third option, which is the most appropriate," says Nisar Effendi. 

 However, environmentalists and landowners of downstream towns oppose this option as well. "Disposal of effluent in such huge quantities from any side would destroy life and around the river," says Dr. Pervaiz Naim, Director of IUCN. He claims that the only viable solution is to dispose of the effluent into artificially-constructed evaporation ponds in Bagothoro, where vast areas of barren land are available. Moreover, the maximum temperature there is over 40 degrees centigrade in summer. 

Dr. Naim says the disposal of effluent into evaporation ponds would have two positive effects. On the one hand, it would save the Indus and the environment downstream and, on the other, natural grass would grow on the barren Kirthar hills with the increase in moisture in the air due to evaporation. Moreover, the ponds would serve as a source of salt which could be used for industrial purposes and also create income for the people of the locality. 

WAPDA's chief engineer (west), Gian Chand Pinjani, however, disagrees, saying that the level in the proposed site of the ponds is high and a number of pumping stations would have to be set up to throw the effluent into evaporation ponds, which would incur recurring costs. Furthermore, another feasibility study would have to be conducted for their project. "We have already spent a lot of money on the study and execution of RBOD-2," says Pinjani. 

"We advocated the RBOD-2 because it will discharge effluent into the river at the proposed site of Sehwan barrage. We have also considered taking the Indus Link effluent over the Indus through a siphon or pipe to dispose it into the Left Bank Outfall Drain (LBOD)," he adds, saying that if the Sehwan Barrage project goes through, passing the effluent through the barrage structure would be cost-effective and easy. 

After the remodelling of LBOD, the effluent from the right bank would be disposed of into the Arabian sea. Experts, however, believe that this is not a workable solution, since the LBOD has itself developed technical defects. "The LBOD is a failed project and donor agencies have already stopped funds due to its defective designing, so how can it support the RBOD?" asks Dr. Pervaiz Naim. 

 Despite the controversy, the Nawaz Sharif government had given WAPDA the go-ahead for the project which is already 40 per cent complete. Under pressure from environmentalists and landowners, the Sindh government has since constituted a committee to examine the environmental effects of the RBOD discharge. During its first meeting in June 1998, the committee asked WAPDA and NESPAK to provide details about alternatives for disposing of effluent into the sea, including new alternative sites with cost estimates and maps. 

"We have asked WAPDA to stop work on the project till a final decision is reached," says Idris Rajput, secretary of the Sindh Irrigation Department. But WAPDA officials claim that work on the Indus Link is continuing. Contractors of the IL-3 section, Federal Works Organisation (FWO), are still working through WAPDA owes them 45 million rupees. About half the work on this section has been completed. According to WAPDA sources, the contractors for IL-1 have abandoned work and gone into litigation due to delays in payment While the fishermen of Manchhar are demanding an immediate resolution of the issue and an end to the pollution of the lake, Pinjani says, "We are still waiting for a decision by the Sindh government committee which has not met in the last 10 months."