ISLAMABAD: The federal government on Thursday dismissed criticism by both its allies and opposition parties that it was not taking care of the internally displaced persons (IDPs) well.

Addressing a press conference here, government’s focal person for the IDPs federal Minister retired Lt Gen Abdul Qadir Baloch said that: “It’s very unfortunate that the issue of IDPs is being politicised just to undermine the government.”

Referring to a recently held jirga by Khyber Pakhtunkhwa-based political parties and Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) chairman Imran Khan’s statements in which he has accused the government of not sparing enough resources for the IDPs, the minister said those who were raising the voice for the IDPs should first check what measures the government had already taken for the displaced people.

He said every displaced family was receiving Rs22,000 every month as a subsistence allowance of which Rs12,000 were being contributed by the federal government, Rs7,000 by the Punjab government and Rs3,000 by the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government. Besides, the government provides them ration regularly and an army’s field hospital with 50-member staff of PIMS provides them health care facilities. Over 20,000 displaced children had been enrolled in various schools, he added.

The minister claimed that there had never been dearth of resources for the IDPs and that it was an absolutely a wrong impression that the government was ignoring their genuine needs.

The government had estimated that it would require Rs30 billion for the IDPs by June next year, he said, adding that “we are in very much position to provide the said amount”.

Talking about rehabilitation of IDPs, the minister said the government had made an estimate of Rs70 billion for which the finance minister had already reached out to international donors. Answering a question, he said the number of verified IDPs was around 1.5 million.

Published in Dawn, November 21th, 2014