MANSEHRA: The people in Red Zone of Balakot tehsil here on Sunday demanded early development of the New Balakot City for the transfer of plots to them.

“Even 17 years after the housing project’s groundbreaking, we’re living a miserable life in makeshift shelters,” lawyer Junaid Alam Khan told reporters in Balakot.

Accompanied by a group of residents, he said the project meant for the survivors of the 2005 earthquake was in the doldrums.

Mr Junaid said work on the New Balakot City was inaugurated in 2007 by the then military ruler, General Pervez Musharraf.

“Our courts and all offices are still functioning in makeshift structures but this housing project has yet to be completed,” he said.

Quake survivors complain work suspended for eight years

The lawyer said people of Balakot and Garlat union councils that were part of the red zone still lived in makeshift shelters. He demanded an immediate allotment of New Balakot City plots to quake survivors.

“The development of this housing project was suspended eight years ago but hasn’t been resumed despite assurance by the successive governments,” he said.

Mr Junaid said the Supreme Court had ordered both federal and provincial governments almost eight years ago to complete the project and allot plots to earthquake survivors, but no to avail.

He said the provincial government should allot plots to those families before completing work.

“Earthquake survivors are hopeful that the new government in the province and centre will ensure an early plot allotment and New Balakot City development,” he said.

CRACKDOWN: The police on Sunday began a search for killers of two people in mountainous parts of Kolai-Palas district.

An old enmity led to those murders, according to police.

“We have started an operation against the killers of a man and his nephew,” Kolai’s deputy superintendent of police Abdul Rauf told reporters.

He said a police contingent was present in the Kolai area to arrest culprits.

The FIR said gunmen Mohammad Yunus and his collaborator seriously injured Mohammad Zarif Khan and his nephew Mohammad Tehsil and fled.

It added that the injured were shifted to the civil hospital in Pattan area of Lower Kohistan but they died.

The police said the enmity between two families of Admakheil tribe started three years ago over the cutting of firewood in a local forest and it had so far claimed three lives.

Meanwhile, the Battal police seized a large quantity of narcotics foiling the bid to smuggle them to Mansehra from Peshawar.

The police raided the Chaterplan area and arrested drug peddler Pervez Malik and seized charas and other drugs.

The police said in a news release that their operation against narcotics dealers across the district had turned out to be successful.

Published in Dawn, February 26th, 2024