NAROWAL: The driver and helper of a truck were seriously injured after their loaded vehicle overturned on the dilapidated Zafarwal-Narowal road.

Driver Jamshed Khan and helper Mahmood were shifted to the DHQ hospital by a Rescue 1122 ambulance.

The 27-kilometre road from Narowal to Zafarwal tehsil has been damaged at various locations for so long that one to two feetwidepotholes have developed on it due to which the journey through it takes at least two to three hours. The rocky condition of the road causes minor and major accidents every day and sewage is accumulated on it almost all year round.

Five people have been killed and more than 45 injured in various accidents in the recent past.

The private cars, passenger vans and buses that often get stuck in the potholes are pulled out with the help of locals and tractors. Freight trucks and dumpers also find it difficult to ply and sometimes even overturn.

Irfan Ali and Muhammad Hafeez, local residents of Zafarwal, said they had applied to the district administration and the Punjab chief minister several times for reconstruction of the road, but no one was ready to pay attention to the issue.

They said that provincial Religious Affairs MinisterPir Syed Saeedul Hassan also visited his village of Zafarwal once a week and returned to Lahore through the same road. But even he could not manage to get it rebuilt.

Ali said Chief Minister Usman Buzdar has visited Zafarwal twice and both the times he had left with the promise to get the road repaired immediately.

Locals demanded Chief Minister Buzdar take notice of the situation and get the road repaired at the earliest.

Published in Dawn, December 22nd, 2020