MINGORA: Residents of Kalam Matiltan have vowed not to allow resumption of construction work on the 84MW Matiltan Gorkin power project until the government paid them the agreed upon rates for their lands.

They made the decision at a jirga attended by elders from Kalam, Oshu and Matiltan areas here on Tuesday. Before holding the jirga, the residents staged a protest against the government for failing to pay the land prices.

They said they had given their agricultural lands for the power project, but the government was delaying payments despite settlement of all the legal matters and the fixing of rates.

“The government has started construction work on the power project but has yet to make payments despite passage of one year since the agreement was struck,” Irfanullah Khan, a resident of Matiltan, deplored, saying though the government initially paid money for some of the agricultural land acquired for the project, payment for the remaining 162 kanals of non-agricultural land was still pending.

The elders said they had the ownership documents of the land from the days of former Swat state, but despite that the government applied different delaying tactics in making payments to the landowners.

“For the non-agricultural land, the government had fixed Rs500,000 per kanal after the landowners protested the authorities’ refusal to pay for such land,” Syed Mohammad Khan, a village councillor from Osho Matiltan village, said.

The affected landowners also accused Bahrain assistant commissioner of being harsh to the landowners whenever they put up the case with him.

The elders appealed to the chief minister to order release of the withheld payments.

Bahrain AC Aftab Ahmad said the district administration was in consultation with the local elders and jirga members, and hoped to resolve the issue soon and resume the construction work on the power project.

It is to be recalled here that the locals had stopped work on the power project some three months ago over non-payment of compensation.

Published in Dawn, September 26th, 2018