SHANGLA: Students of private schools here have started clearing the Damorai road on self-help basis after failure of the district administration authorities and the government to reopen it to traffic. The road has been closed at various points for the last two months due to landslides.

A large number of students of the private schools took part in the campaign to remove rubble from the Damorai-Shapoor road.

Shah Khalid, a student, said that a delegation, including local elders and elected representatives, had met the deputy commissioner, Shangla, in this regard, but in vain. “We have no other option but to clear the road on self-help basis,” he said.

Say landslides had hit Damorai road two months ago

He said that the road had been closed for the last two months, but neither the government nor the local elected representatives took interest in its reopening. He said that people, particularly students, were facing problems in reaching their schools on time.

Kashif Bilal, another student, said that the road linked several villages of Kana tehsil with Shapoor Bazaar, which people visited in routine to buy food stuff or shift their patients to hospitals in other areas.

He said that an estimated 60,000 population of Damorai, Karshat, Ajmeer, Belkanai, Logay and surrounding areas used this route. He said that students from grade-8 to grade-10 took part in the clearing task. Other youth of the area also joined the students in this welfare work.

The students regretted that the political parties and their local representatives were not solving problems being faced by the people.

However, Shangla Action Committee’s former chairman Mohmmad Naeem said that the road was blocked at many points and it would need heavy machinery to remove rubble. He said that debris of landslides was still lying on the Swat-Bisham road and several other roads causing problems for the motorists. He said that despite assurance by KP Assembly Speaker Asad Qaiser the flood-hit infrastructure of roads and bridges had still not been restored.

When contacted, tehsil muncipal officer Afzal Khan said that the road maintenance work would start when the provincial government would release funds for it.

Published in Dawn, May 27th, 2016