Sindhi Pages

Industry

There is no major industry in the district. Only one ice factory, five carpet industries and thirty eight flour mills are available in the district.

Mining

Sulphur deposits are found at Karoonjhar Hills in Nagar Parkar taluka besides granite stone and china clay. Coal deposits have been recovered at Warwai, a small village near lslamkot. This is one of the 13 places in the district where coal deposits have been found.

Thar Coal Deposits

Tharparkar district is spread over an area of around 20,000 square kilometers. Of this over 9,000 square kilometers is identified coal-field having estimated reserves of around 200 billion tones of good quality lignite, suitable for power generation. The coalfield is located at a distance of around 400 kilometers in north east of Karachi. Thar coal is being developed as a fuel, specially for power generation, which is enough to meet fuel requireents of the country for centuries arid would provide a sustainable and reliable power genration programme.

Granite

The Tharparkar district comprised in-exhaustible good quality granite deposits at Nagarparkar. on Pak india border. Entire Karoonjhar Range of mountain is granite. Local mining companies are engaged in granite mining and polishing. There is a lot of potential for investment in granite mining and processing.

Trade and Trade Centres

The urban centres of Tharparkar and their markets. though, have developed and expanded resultantly iacreased the mechanised transport, yet there is no central place of trade in the district.

Communications

The district is not rich in means of communications. There is neither railway nor air services available. Before 1950's transportation was entirely by animals or private jeeps. The first GMCs (6 wheel drive trucks) started plying in 1956. Those carried only passengers and were two in number. By 1967, these had increased to 25, but they still catered mainly to passengers to and from the desert. In the mid-seventies there was a big inl.:rease in the GMCs and by 1987 there were over 100 plying from Naukot to the desert and over 50 from Umerkot. These GMCs continue to ply their routes on the non-metalled roads of the desert despite the radical increase in the number of two and four-wheel drive vehicles, which are more fuel efficient and cost less to maintain, over the last decade. The increase in vehicular traffic has taken place not only because of an increase in passenger traffic but more so of the need to transport grain and daily necessities of life from and to Thar. It also indicates an increasingly mobile society in the region.

The metalled roads available in the district are as follows:

The district is inter-connected with Postal and Telecommunication facilities. As requested by the office of Deputy Commissioner, Tharparkar there are 11 telephone exchanges and 3 post offices in 1997-98.