CHITRAL: A village in upper Chitral was disconnected from other villages of the council, situated on the other side of the Chitral River, after its pedestrian suspension bridge was washed away by flood.

Maulana Javed Hussain, a member of district council from Mulkhow, said that washing away of the bridge caused numerous problems for the villagers on both sides of the river as they had to walk for four hours to cross the river through the nearest bridge.

He said that Biyaar was the only village situated on the other side of the river that flanked Kaghlusht, the pasture of Nogram village council. He said that the dwellers of the isolated village were wholly depended on the village on the opposite side ranging from shopping to schooling of their children and attending its mosques for Friday prayers.

Students can’t attend school situated on the other side of the river

Mr Hussain said that although the villagers crossed the river through the distant bridge to fetch commodities of daily use, yet the students could not go to school for the last two weeks as they could not walk for eight hours on daily basis.

He said that patients also could not be taken to the hospital and any outbreak of disease in the village could prove dangerous. He added that social life in the village was affected the villagers were no more able to interact with the larger community on the side of the river.

“As elected representative of the area, I have approached all the relevant government offices but everywhere I was told that there were no funds available for rehabilitation of the bridge,” said the dejected member of district council.

The situation has also caused hardships for the villagers on the other side of the river as they could not send their livestock for grazing to the pasture of Kaghlusht to where they used to send their sheep and goats on daily basis.

A common pasture, Kaghlusht provided the people of Nogram not only place of grazing but the villagers also collected dried shrubs from there to use as fuel.

SUICIDE: A 23-year-woman committed suicide in Kari village on Thursday by consuming poison.

An official of Chitral police station identified the deceased as Parwaz Bibi. The reason of the suicide is said to be domestic bickering with her in-laws.

The villagers said that the deceased had been married seven years ago in a village in Punjab but she got divorce from her husband and came back to the village with her one-year-old son. The boy is now six-year-old.

Published in Dawn, September 21st, 2018