MANSEHRA: All three candidates for the Mansehra tehsil council seat from Parain union council on Saturday announced the boycott of the Dec 23 by-elections over the fears of violence.

During a joint news conference here, independent candidate Nadir Khan, PML-N’s Munir Shah and PTI’s Chan Peer also said they had formally requested the deputy commissioner to cancel the electoral exercise in Parain.

Mr Nadir said all candidates feared that their supporters would clash on the election day and thus, creating a law and order situation.

He said dozens of the supporters of candidates had suffered injuries in clashes in the 2016 elections.

Mr Peer said he and two other candidates had submitted a joint request to the deputy commissioner for the by-election’s cancellation.

The tehsil councillor’s office in Parain had fallen vacantearlier this year after Nadir Khan resigned from it to contest the general elections for the PK-31 Mansehra seat.

PROJECTS: The government has approved two major road and water projects for Mansehra district. “The chief minister has accorded the formal approval to the construction of the bypass road and execution of the gravity flow water supply scheme at the cost of Rs6.5 billion,” MPA Babar Saleem Swatitold reporters here on Saturday.

Mr Swati said he and Mansehra MNA Salah Mohammad Khan met the chief minister the other day and got the two schemes approved.

He said work on the water scheme would begin within a week or two and would be completed with the help of Saudi grant.

Published in Dawn, December 9th, 2018