HARIPUR: The district administration had formally approached the Pakistan Navy for extending help in the search for the bodies of the victims onboard a boat that capsized in Tarbela Lake on Wednesday last, additional deputy commissioner Baidullah Shah said while talking to a delegation of family members of some of the boat incident victims here on Tuesday.

The relatives of the victims lamented that the entire Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province had long been using the funds meant for the welfare of affected communities of Tarbela Dam under the net hydel profit from the federal government, but those who sacrificed their land for the project were deprived of road infrastructure and basic facilities.

They said owing to long land route the people of Torghar, Darband, Nara Amazai and Bait Gali were forced to travel by boats.

They demanded that the government construct a bridge on the River Indus linking Torghar, Shangla, Darband and Haripur so that their lives could be saved from such tragedies in future.

ADC Baidullah Shah told the delegation that the search operation would continue for the missing boat victims and that the administration had approached Pakistan Navy to make available its divers for fishing out the bodies.

He said the demand for construction of a bridge on the Tarbela Lake would also be taken up with the provincial government.

Meanwhile, the divers continued search for the missing boat passengers, but with no success.

THREE KILLED: Three persons were killed in different incidents, police said on Tuesday.

Arsalan, 28, of Bandi Seehran was critically injured when his motorcycle crashed against a roadside pole while on way to Hattar Industrial Estate.

He was shifted to the Haripur Trauma Centre but he bled to death before receiving any treatment.

Unknown attackers shot dead Mohammad Ramzan when he was attending funeral prayers of a relative in Kag village. The attackers escaped. The motive behind the killing was not known, police said.

Also, an electrician working with a private contractor was electrocuted while replacing a faulty transformer.

He was named Shah Nawaz.

Published in Dawn, July 10th, 2019