BATTAGRAM: People of Battagram on Monday rejected the ‘unjust’ distribution of Sehat Sahulat Insaf cards, complaining that the scheme was launched on the basis of previous BISP poverty survey.

They also complained that wealthy people were being benefited in the programme at the cost of deserving people.

Shayan Khan, a local resident, told Dawn that purpose of the project was to facilitate the people who could not afford treatment in hospitals, but it was facilitating the undeserving people.

Jamal Khan, another resident, alleged that the scheme was launched with the objective of gaining political mileage. He said the politicians had no regard for the poor people, and they only approached them when they needed votes to reach power corridors.

Javed Iqbal Ulasyar, a social activist, said the Sehat cards should be distributed on merit among deserving people.

Haji Imdad Ullah, local JI emir, said the provincial government needed to ensure that only poor people were facilitated under the scheme.

Imtiaz Ahmed, district coordinator of Zwanan Development Organisation, the NGO which is tasked with distributing the cards, said 38,442 Sehat cards would be distributed among the families selected in BISP poverty survey.

He said every Sehat card holder would get treatment facility in public sector hospitals and the government would pay treatment expenditures up to Rs540,000 per year.

Adnan Khan, another official of the NGO, told Dawn that the organisation was distributing the Sehat cards among those people who were selected in BISP survey conducted in 2009-10.

He said names of those who were now dead, or the women married, were removed from the family tree replaced by the other members.

Published in Dawn January 24th, 2017