TIMERGARA: Residents of Shehzadi village on Monday blocked Timergara-Chitral road at Ashari Gat for over two hours against Pesco’s failure to restore power supply to the village even after about three weeks of its suspension due to a faulty transformer.

Dozens of local residents led by former MPA Mohammad Zamin Khan came onto the road and chanted slogans against the government and Pesco. They held a protest rally on the road, blocking it for over two hours.

Addressing the rally, the PPP leader Muhammad Zamin alleged that power supply to Shehzadi and the adjoining hamlets had been cut due to a faulty transformer.

He said the residents had no power supply during the last days of Ramazan and Eid. “I personally contacted deputy commissioner, chief engineer Pesco and commissioner Malakand division in this regard but to no avail,” he said, adding the concerned authorities had no sympathy for poor masses.

The protesters told journalists that they had been compelled to come onto the roads after their women threatened to protest the power suspension.

Later, the assistant commissioner Timergara Shah Jamil Khan, SHO Timergara Roshan Khan and SHO Balambat Imran Khan held talks with protesters and assured them to repair the faulty transformer, after which the protesters dispersed peacefully.

JI DEMAND: Jamaat-i-Islami, Lower Dir chapter, on Monday demanded of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government to immediately transfer the district police officer Ghulam Habib for his failure to maintain law and order in the district.

Speaking at a news conference at the Timergara Press Club, JI vice emir Izazul Mulk Afkari, information secretary Malik Sher Bahadar, former union council nazim Shafiullah, Khaista Rehman and others alleged that the DPO locked 30 security officials of the special branch in Balambat quarter guard in a bid to hide police failure in protecting lives and properties of people.

The JI leaders demanded of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa police chief to order inquiry into the matter. They said that incidents of killings, car lifting, robbery, kidnapping for ransom and extortion were on the rise in the district. They threatened to bring people on the roads if the government didn’t transfer the DPO out of the district.

Published in Dawn, August 5th, 2014