HARIPUR: The annual 111th Jashn-i-Hazara festival started at Curtis Ground amid tight security here on Saturday.

Federal minister for energy Omar Ayub Khan performed the opening ceremony of the three-day festival held to entertain the local communities with different cultural events during the wheat harvesting season every year in Haripur.

Players from different parts of Hazara turned up at the festival and exhibited their sports skills while the local species of vegetables and fruit and products were also put on display.

According to the schedule, horse dance, tonga race, bull race, tent pegging, PT show, marathon race, weightlifting, stone lifting, gatka fight, wrestling and Kabadi would be part of the festival. Students from different government schools presented PT show, while bull race, stone lifting and wrestling were the events of the opening day.

Speaking at the opening ceremony, the federal minister said that the PTI government was utilising its efforts for taping the cultural and tourism-related resources for the betterment of area and economy.

He said that Jashne Hazara mela, which was named after late district nazim Raja Nasir Kiyani, had been a regular festival that showed adherence to the cultural heritage and identity of people of Haripur and rest of Hazara division.

Omar Ayub said that besides providing entertainment to local communities the festival always helped in promoting the local agricultural and horticultural outputs and the works of local artisans. He said that the local agricultural produce and livestock had always earned appreciation from across the country.

District nazim Akhtar Nawaz, provincial minister Akbar Ayub, DDAC chairman Arshad Ayub and local officials were in attendance on this occasion.

RESIDENTS PROTEST: The residents of Sector No 2 of Khalabat Township here on Saturday staged a protest against the town’s municipal administration for blocking the rainwater course by dumping solid waste there.

The protesters chanted slogans against the municipal administration and accused its officials of exposing the ongoing campaign of ‘Clean and Green Pakistan’ to failure.

Led by village council Tarbela No 3 naib nazim, the residents said that the township officials had dumped tonnes of collected solid waste in the rainwater course that the irrigation department had dug for drainage from residential areas between Chungi No 3 and the bank of Tarbela Lake.

They have demanded early removal of the waste from the rainwater course.

Published in Dawn, April 21st, 2019