September 7, 2003	Sunday	Rajab 9, 1424

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LANDI  KOTAL, Sept 6: The Khyber Agency public  health department incurred a loss of Rs 21.7 million due to ill-planning and lack of knowledge about deep digging of tubewells in Landi Kotal subdivision.

Digging of seven tubewells, approved for Zakhakhel area, was left half way by the concerned department. The government had allocated Rs 3.1 million for each tubewell.

Out of the seven tubewells, two were allocated for Sultankhel village, two for Walikhel and one each for Malik Darya Khan Killi, Sheikhwal and Satra Meel Picket. Digging of all seven tubewells has been abandoned since long.

According to a survey, the water table in all these areas was 800 feet below ground level. But the public health staff stopped their digging at all locations after digging 400 feet.

The reasons cited by them was that the machinery was unable to dig below 400 feet because of the hard rocky nature of the earth.

Malik Abdul Halim, an elder of the area, said the public health engineers lacked knowledge and expertise about their job. He questioned why in the first instance these sites were selected when the machinery was not fit for deep digging and cutting hard stones.

He said that residents of area had pinned high hopes that with the digging of these seven tube wells, water shortage in the area would be effectively overcome.