KARAK: Excessive power loadshedding has severely affected the functioning of the Women and Children Hospital, Karak, with the doctors having to treat the critical patients on the road under the solar-powered streetlights during the nighttime.

Elders of Khattak Ittehad, a rights organisation in Karak, complained that excessive loadshedding and absence of a generator in the women and children hospital had forced doctors to handle emergency cases under the streetlights.

The organisation’s leaders namely Ahmad Jan, Malik Taweez Gul and others told a press conference here on Saturday that Karak was receiving billions of rupees annually as oil and gas royalty, but its people were deprived of even basic facilities of life.

They said unavailability of basic facilities in the hospital reflected on the disinterest of the government towards resolving health issues. They demanded uninterrupted power supply to the health centres, particularly the district and tehsil headquarters hospitals. They threatened to agitate if the matter was no looked into.

A doctor at the emergency of the hospital told Dawn that due to excessive electricity loadshedding, they were forced to treat patients during the night with the help of solar-powered streetlights. He claimed that it had become a routine to check the patients on the road till the time there was loadshedding.

PTI GRAPH DECLINING: Former provincial minister and leader of Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-F Mian Nisar Gul Kakakhel claims that the popularity of the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf has declined sharply.

Addressing party workers on Saturday, he claimed that the people of the province were feeling regret over electing PTI to power as its government had failed to deliver. He alleged that PTI had promoted the culture of vulgarity in the province.

The former minister claimed that despite PTI rule in the province the people were joining JUI-F in large numbers.

Mr Gul recalled that during his tenure as the minister the annual royalty funds of oil and gas for the district were merely Rs700 million, and now the amount had reached Rs1.5 billion but even then there was no sign of development in the district. He said youngsters were deceived in the name of change.

Published in Dawn, October 23rd, 2016