MANSEHRA: Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf MPA Babar Saleem Swati on Monday said the Saudi government would execute the Rs2 billion Mansehra water supply scheme abandoned by the Japan International Cooperation Agency earlier this year.

“The PTI government is committed to addressing the chronic water issue in Mansehra city and its suburbs and will soon launch the mega water supply scheme with the financial assistance of the Saudi government,” Mr Swati told a news conference here. The lawmaker said the provincial government’s talks with the Saudi government on the project were almost finished and that Chief Minister Mehmood Khan would inaugurate work on it soon.

Lawmaker says CM to inaugurate work soon

“The water table has plunged in our city and adjoining areas and thus, worsening water crisis. There is a need to address it without further delay,” he said.

Mr Swati said the Jica had refused to execute to the scheme after the former Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz-led government didn’t sanction the requisite grant for it.

He said Mansehra had gone a strategic position for hosting many China-Pakistan Economic Corridor projects.

“We’ll attract foreign investment here by strictly following international standards in all projects.

BODY FOUND: A newlywed woman was found dead in a deserted place of Garhi Habibullah area here on Monday.

SHO of the Garhi Habibullah police station Yasir Khan told reporters that the deceased had gone missing from her Abbottabad house on the fifth day of marriage.

He said the family of the deceased claimed that she left home to meet a friend on Nov 21 but didn’t return and that they lodged an FIR of her kidnapping with the police the same day. The SHO said the police registered an FIR under Section 302 of CrPC and began investigation.

FUNDS RELEASED: The provincial government has released Rs180 million development funds for the village and neighbourhood councils.

“The finance department has released the second tranche of Rs180 million for equal distribution to 194 village and neighbourhood councils,” general secretary of the Nazmeen Ittehad Basharat Ali told reporters here on Monday.

He said similar amount of money was earlier released for the schemes being executed in village and neighbourhood councils. Mr Basharat said the department would release the remaining two tranches of funds before the end of the current financial year. He also demanded the release of non-developmental funds, withheld since the installation of the local governments in the province.

Published in Dawn, November 27th, 2018