In winter we face severe gas shortage. If the successive governments had done timely planning to meet the supply and demand of gas, our country would not have been going through the current gas crisis. People are facing difficulties as they are compelled to spend a huge amount of money for purchasing food from hotels as there is not sufficient gas to make food at home for the family. People have given up their patience over the continuous issue of gas shortage. They are left with no other options but to hit the streets, they were witnessed protesting and blocking roads in various cities of the country.
Gas is a must in winter as without it people cannot cook, bathe or keep themselves warm, they cannot run automobiles and businesses. It is also evident that gas pipelines were very often blasted by the miscreants in Baluchistan and sometimes technical problems in the gas fields intensify the gas crisis. It is also a cruel fact; we used gas wastefully since it was first discovered in the 1950s in Sui, Baluchistan. However, Baluchistan, especially those living in Sui, were kept away of this vital source of energy. This discrimination provides reason to the alienated nationalists to blow up gas pipelines.
Our governments have failed to create new sources of gas supply. Efforts to import gas from neighbouring countries are not serious. The gas pipeline from Iran has been completed on their side but our side has not started yet. Recently Iran has lifted the late construction penalty to encourage our early return to the project but there are no signs of the project taking off. Lately, we have signed a number of new projects for LNG with Qatar and Iran. Importing gas is not the long lasting solution, proper planning and upgrading of the system to supply gas to consumers countrywide will be as important.
