PESHAWAR: Plan to set up arms industrial zone hits snags
By Shafiq Ahmad
PESHAWAR, May 5: The NWFP government's proposal to establish an industrial zone for arms near Dara Adamkhel has yet to materialize owing to differences cropped up over conditions attached to the plan later.
Another government plan aimed at utilizing the services of Dara Adamkhel arms manufacturers at the Pakistan Ordnance Factory, Wah, has also failed because of the differences between the two sides.
Governor Syed Iftikhar Hussain Shah had unfolded the industrial zone plan in February but did not provide funds to accomplish the task, an elder of Dara Adamkhel, Malik Munawar Khan Afridi, told Dawn.
He said arms dealers had even agreed to pool money required for setting up of the zone, but the government later made some suggestions which were unacceptable to them.
He said the government wanted reduction in the arms production and registration of arms shops with the political authorities. "Both these demands are unacceptable to the tribal arms manufacturers," he added.
The governor had proposed to register only a few arms shops with permission to sell only the locally made weapons. He had also suggested that the registered arms shops should maintain their sale record with complete information about buyers.
But arms manufacturers rejected these proposals and asked the government to purchase all weapons to be manufactured in the proposed industrial zone.
Both the government and arms manufacturers are sticking to their positions with the result that there is stalemate on the issue, said the tribal elder.
The provincial government and the authorities at POF authorities had planned to utilize the expertise of Dara manufacturers by employing them and training them on modern machines to polish their skills, sources said.
But some 25 arms manufacturers out of a total of 50, who were employed at the POF, have left their jobs and the rest are likely to follow suit owing to a low salary offered by the management, said an arms manufacturer.
The person, who worked at the POF, told Dawn that the management put all the Dara arms manufacturers in the labour scale with a monthly salary of Rs2,700 and added that they were also kept away from training.
Sources said the government also did not allow the arms manufacturers to export though they were taken to put their arms on display at many local and international exhibitions.
"We displayed our weapons in exhibitions at Karachi, Dubai and in Saudi Arabia in 2002 and the next year in Germany. We also got orders from traders of the United States, Britain and Germany. However, the government did not permit us to export our arms due to the reasons best known to the authorities," another tribal elder of Dara Adamkhel said.
