Mansehra faces water crisis as wells, boreholes run dry

MANSEHRA: The residents of the Mansehra city and its suburbs on Friday urged the government to ensure the supply of potable water, as the wells and boreholes in the area have dried up.

“We are facing a severe shortage of drinking water in Channia and its surrounding areas because the Tehsil Municipal Administration has failed to supply water to this large urban settlement,” Mohammad Ayub, a resident, told reporters.A group of residents said the underground water table had significantly dropped due to the ongoing drought across the district.

“Almost every second household had its well or bore, but most of them have dried up over the last couple of years, creating an unprecedented water crisis,” Ayub added. He said the TMA had laid pipelines to supply water to Channia and nearby areas around three years ago, but the effort has yet to yield results.

“Pipelines were laid from a shallow well near the Bothkhatta stream to provide water to residents, but despite the spending of significant financial resources, people are still without access to potable water,” he added.

Another resident, Abdul Waheed, said that although funds were approved for a gravity flow water supply scheme, the multi-billion-rupee project had not yet been initiated. “The Channia area, from the Fauji Foundation to Dera on both sides of Abbottabad Road, is suffering immensely due to delays in launching both the shallow well and gravity flow supply schemes,” he said.Mohammad Bashir, another local, urged the TMA to immediately make the shallow well scheme operational to relieve Channia residents of the water crisis.