Taunsa farmers protest three-month CRBC water shortage

Dera Ismail Khan: Thousands of farmers from Taunsa in Punjab, who fall within the command area of the Chashma Right Bank Canal (CRBC), marched nearly 150 kilometres to Dera Ismail Khan on Monday to protest what they described as three months of uninterrupted suspension of irrigation water supplies. Upon reaching the city, they joined local farmers and staged a sit in at Qureshi Mor.

The protest caravan, led by Jamaat e Islami Taunsa leader Azizullah Qaisrani, alleged that large scale water theft within the Dera Ismail Khan section of the Chashma Right Bank Canal has prevented irrigation water from reaching the tail-end areas of Taunsa for the past three months. According to the protesters, more than a one hundred thousand acres of standing crops have been devastated, leaving thousands of farmers facing severe financial hardship.

Malik Masjid Dhap, a leader of the Chamber of Agriculture Dera Ismail Khan, said the CRBC water distribution crisis revolves around three major issues. First, the inter-provincial Chashma Right Bank Canal has a designed carrying capacity of 5,000 cusecs, of which 3,200 cusecs are allocated to Dera Ismail Khan in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and 1,800 cusecs to Taunsa in Punjab. However, he said, only around 3,400 cusecs are currently being released into the canal instead of its full capacity. According to him, officials of the Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA) have attributed the reduced discharge to the deteriorating condition of the canal, saying its infrastructure can no longer safely sustain a flow of 5,000 cusecs without rehabilitation.

The second issue, he said, concerns influential landowners in Dera Ismail Khan who have allegedly erected obstructions within the canal and constructed oversized outlets (moghas) to increase water supplies to their distributaries, enabling them to draw substantially more water than their legal entitlement.

The third issue, according to Malik Masjid Dhap, is the large-scale theft of canal water through hundreds of high-powered pumping units installed along the western bank of the canal. He claimed that these pumps collectively extract more than 120 cusecs of water, depriving not only tail-end farmers in Dera Ismail Khan but also growers in Taunsa of their rightful share. He further stated that the water shortage in Taunsa has become so severe that many communities are struggling to secure drinking water, while even livestock owners lack sufficient water for their animals. He warned that the crisis is no longer confined to agriculture and is rapidly developing into a humanitarian emergency.

Leaders of the Taunsa farmers’ delegation also alleged that hundreds of solar powered high capacity pumps continue to extract large quantities of water from the canal. They accused the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Irrigation Department and the district administration of failing to curb water theft or take effective action against those allegedly involved. They warned that unless equitable distribution of canal water is ensured, thousands of farming families will continue to suffer economic losses and Taunsa could face a broader humanitarian crisis.

During the protest, Assistant Commissioner Dr. Hamid held negotiations with representatives of the demonstrators. The protesting farmers were subsequently invited to meet officials of the Irrigation Department responsible for regulating the CRBC system. Later, a delegation of farmers from Punjab also held detailed talks with the Deputy Commissioner of Dera Ismail Khan, focusing on measures to prevent water theft, ensure fair distribution of canal water, and restore irrigation supplies to the affected areas of Taunsa.

The protesters demanded an immediate end to illegal water extraction from the canal, strict legal action against those responsible, and the uninterrupted release of Taunsa’s allocated share of irrigation water to prevent further destruction of crops.

It is pertinent to mention that only a few days earlier, farmers within the command area of the Chashma Right Bank Canal in Dera Ismail Khan had also staged large-scale protests against alleged water theft and what they described as the inequitable distribution of canal water. Agricultural experts warn that unless the dispute over water allocation is resolved promptly, it could heighten tensions among farming communities in both provinces and adversely affect agricultural production as well as the regional economy.