GILGIT, Jan 7: The Northern Areas Public Works Department (NAPWD) has failed to bring back the Chinese engineers for completing work on four-megawatt hydel power project in Guro Jaglote, sources told Dawn on Sunday.

The engineers had left for China immediately after the Sep 11 attack on Pentagon and the World Trade Center, owing to security reasons . The work on the power project remained suspended since then, the source added.

The scheme was started in 1998 and scheduled to be completed in October 2001 on turn-key basis.

Northern Areas Secretary Works Brig Masroor Abbasi, at high-level meeting, had assured the Northern Areas Legislative Council in November that the government was making arrangements to bring back these engineers by December 2001.

Sources at the NAPWD said that they had received no positive response from the Chinese authorities about sending the engineers to complete the project.

Cities of the Northern Areas were facing an acute shortage of electricity and situation became grave in winter, traders and shopkeepers in Gilgit said.

Northern Areas Chief Executive Abbas Sarfraz Khan, during his recent visit to the region, had also vowed to overcome the power crisis within a three years by installing a 18-megawatt hydel power project in Nalter, 30kms off Gilgit, at a cost of Rs1 billion.

But the residents in Gilgit and Baltistan argued that these assurances from the officials were not new.

DEMAND: People in Gilgit, Hunza, Nagar Ghizer demanded of the Northern Areas Settlements Department to immediately disburse compensation to flood victims.