BAJAUR: The residents of Sadiqabad area of Bajaur tribal district on Monday held a protest against unavailability of subsidised flour and blocked Khar-Peshawar Highway to all sorts of traffic for several hours.

The protesters chanted slogans against the district administration, the management of local flour mills and flour dealers. They said that they subsidised flour was not available in the area.

They said that district administration allocated about 300 bags of subsidised flour for Sadiqabad on daily basis after the crisis of flour emerged in the country.

However, they alleged that the number of bags was either decreased or the supply was suspended during the last few days owing to unknown reasons.

The protesters said that they had been visiting the outlet of subsidised for the last one week but could not found even a single bag of flour there.

Block main road to traffic for about two hours

The local political activists and traders addressed the protesters and expressed concerns over unavailability of subsidised flour in the area.

They said that Sadiqabad was one of the populated regions of the district where most of residents were poor and could not afford to buy flour from open market.

They said that the subsidized flour was meant to provide relief to poor.

They said the people of Sadiqabad were deprived of subsidised flour which was a matter of serious concern for them.

The speakers asked the district administration to take notice of the issue and order the management of local flour mills to resume supply of flour to Sadiqabad without further delay.

They threatened to take to streets in a large number if the issue was resolved.

A large number of commuters and motorists remained stuck in the protest as the road was blocked to traffic for about two hours.

A senior official told this scribe that supply of subsidised flour was not susoended to the area.

However, he acknowledged that quantity of subsidised flour for Sadiqabad was not enough for the residents of the area.

Meanwhile, the authorities on Monday recovered weapons and explosives in a hilly locality of Salarzai tehsil.

Officials said that the weapons and explosives were recovered from the hideouts of terrorists in the remote Dara area during an intelligence-based operation conducted jointly by security forces and police.

They said that weapons and explosives included 11 hand grenades, 12 fuses of hand grenades, one Russian made shell, one local made shell, half kilogram explosives, three cans of explosives, seven packed phone and scores of ammunition.

Published in Dawn, October 13th, 2020