PESHAWAR, Sept 1: Residents of Mattani have claimed that no doctor was present on duty at the local civil hospital on Friday due to which the people wounded in a bomb blast had to be taken to the Lady Reading Hospital, Peshawar.

They said that the absent doctors were responsible for the death of all those, who succumbed to their injuries on way to the LRH.

These views were expressed by Mattani elders while talking to Kushdil Khan, deputy speaker of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly, during his visit to the hospital on Saturday.

A number of elders, including former nazim Asad Khan, Tika Khan and members of local Islahi Committee, said that the health minister had twice inaugurated different blocks of the hospital and promised to provide required facilities but to no avail.

They said that Mattani was located about 30 kilometres away from Peshawar city and emergency patients often succumb to their critical conditions during shifting. They said that provision of medical facilities at local level was need of the hour.

The deputy speaker assured the people that he would raise the issue in the assembly on Monday in order to ensure provision of health facilities in the area.

During his visit to the hospital, the speaker noted that doctors were absent from their duty. He was informed that no doctor was present on duty at the time of Friday’s bomb blast and only a medical technician was present in the hospital, and the wounded persons were taken to Lady Reading Hospital. Meanwhile, the area people have decided to mourn the death of 12 people today (Sunday) by keeping the shutters down in Mattani area.