June 01, 2008	Sunday	Jamadi-ul-Awwal 26, 1429

SIALKOT, May 31: Hundreds of locals on Saturday staged a demonstration in Daska to protest delays in construction of Stadium Road project for the past six months.

The contractor has now abandoned the project worth millions of rupees allegedly due to the negligence of Tehsil Municipal Administration (TMA) officials concerned and the incomplete road is adding to the miseries of the masses.

Haji Muhammad Anwar, Inayatullah, Chaudhry Abdul, Haji Muhammad Jamil and Muhammad Rasheed led the demonstrators who were carrying banners and placards while chanting slogans against NESPAK and the TMA officials.

They said that the TMA gave the contract of two-kilometre road from Civil Hospital Chowk to Municipal Stadium to NESPAK’s contractor, Messer Malik Corporation, 269-Cavalry Ground, Lahore, which started construction of the road around six months ago.

They said that due to undisclosed reasons, the chief executive officer of the construction firm, Imran Malik, first ordered removing newly-laid layers of the soil from the under-construction road and then vanished after leaving the project unfinished.They alleged that their repeated complaints in this connection fell on deaf ears of the TMA officials concerned.

They urged the provincial and district government to take action against the contractor and the TMA officials. When contacted, the TMA engineering staffers refused to comment.

RELEASED: District and Sessions Judge Suhaib Ahmad Roomi visited the Sialkot District Jail on Saturday and ordered release of 59 prisoners involved in petty offences.

The judge inspected the jail’s security measures besides listening to the complaints of inmates and staffers.