Pakistan a Water Scare Country; Investigating the issue with religious perspective
Imagine you wakeup one morning and with sleepy eyes you turn on the
tap of your bathroom to take a bath but unfortunately you find that
water has run out . Think for a minute what will happen? Nothing
because it’s not a big deal you will purchase it or arrange it from
somewhere but for how long ? Because at the end of 2021 International
Monetary Fund ( IMF ) published a report which quotes “ Pakistan’s
annual per capita water availability is 1017 cubicmetre which is
desperately close to the scarcity level of 1000 cubic metres (international
standard for scarcity).” Furthermore According to UNDP and PCRWR
reports Pakistan will run dry or reach absolute water scarcity by 2025 .
And you might be astonished to hear that this will not occur over a night
because PCRWR report 2016 claims that we have touched the ‘’water
stress line’’ in 1990 Dueto this alarming situation, Pakistan is ranked
third among the countries facing severe water shortage. If you are
thinking we have lack of water resources you are wrong because we are
blessed with greatest mass and collection of glacier on earth outside
the polar regions. Here a question raises then why we are going to be dry
country? The answer of this question is very simple that we never know
the worth of water till the well is dry. Because we are the 4th largest
ground water withdrawing country in the world and among top five
waste water producing countries also. Despite all these facts and figures,
we are the second most populous Muslim country in the world , after
Indonesia. If we take a look over Islamic teachings about water our
Prophet Muhammad ﷺ Prohibit us from the extravagance of water
even we are on the bank of the running stream. Our prophet was used
to bath with one Sa’a (approximately 2.4 litres of water) and use to make
ablution with onemudd (which contain about 775ml or 2/3 ofa litre).
These habits of Holy Prophet Muhammad ﷺ are also sunnah and role
model for us. As we know that Pakistan is an agro-based economy. And
our overall productivity from agriculture sector is based upon water
resource. According to Pakistan Council of Research in Water
Resources (PCRWR) Pakistan has one of the largest contiguous irrigation
system in the world where more than 93% water used in aagriculture
sector aand this sector contributes 18.9% to GDP and engage 42.3% of
labour force. But the problem is that about 50% of water in agriculture
sector is wasted due to mismanagement and inefficient (outdated)
irrigation techniques. Holy Quran said “O children of ‘Adam, take on your
adornment at every mosque. Eat and drink and do not be extravagant.
Surely, He does not like the extravagants’’ (7:31) We are Muslim majority
state and Islamic teachings are very significant about water, So, why not
we use these teachings to combat water scarcity challenge. Mosques and
religious sectors of our society can play a key role for solving this issue.
But their is a needto engage influential religious scholars of our society
by the government, i am pretty much sure that this plan will work
because an NGO in Dijikot district, Faisalabad, worked on this idea with
influential scholars of selected mosques of Dijikot just for two months
and after two months a survey was done which gives a very surprising
result of 50% decrease in complaints of water shortage in houses.
So, government shouldselect some influential religious scholars who
give the people awareness about the water shortage in Islamic
perspective through Friday sermons and different courses, workshops
and media platforms. This must be very effective way because our
society always have a soft corner for islamic teachings and a common
man will consider their point of view very easily.
