KHYBER: Authorities here have started distributing cash grants to thousands of displaced families of Tirah Valley after completion of their evacuation process early this month.

The authorities had earlier agreed to pay Rs250,000 to each displaced family after thorough verification by the officials concerned duly assisted by National Database and Registration Authority’s record.

It was agreed prior to the start of displacements from Tirah that every family would be given Rs250,000 as lump sum cash grant along with Rs50,000 monthly stipend till their return in April.

An additional Rs22,000 transport fare was already paid to most of the displaced families, though with reservations from some quarters about alleged malpractice in its full payment and use of fake tokens by hundreds of undeserving families.

While confirming completion of the first phase of evacuation from Tirah, officials said that the second phase of disbursement of cash grant, starting from February 12, was now in progress after thorough verification and scrutiny of all the displaced families.

They said that the main purpose of re-verification and scrutiny was to ensure transparency, correction in earlier compiled data of displaced families and judicious distribution of cash grant among the deserving people of Tirah.

They said that so far about 1,100 families had been provided cash grants through their mobile SIM cards which they were provided during their process of registration at the Paindi Cheena registration centre.

There were, however, complaints from the recipients that they were not given the full amount and authorities had withheld Rs10,000 from the total Rs250,000.

Displaced families also complained about tampering in the number of actual registered families as only 19,000 families out of the total about 32,000 were selected on the basis of previous polio vaccination campaigns in Tirah Valley while depriving the rest of all official assistance.

These families insisted that no polio vaccination campaign had been conducted in Tirah for the last three years due to the security situation and thus denying them any official assistance merely on polio vaccination record was highly unjustified.

Authorities were yet to give a satisfactory response about the actual number of beneficiary families along with a legitimate reason for deduction of Rs10,000 from the actual promised grant of Rs250,000.

It was also learnt that some displaced persons along with local social and political activists have approached the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Right to Information official forum in order to lodge a complaint against the Khyber district administration for ‘unlawfully refusing’ assistance to hundreds of deserving displaced families along with deduction in the cash grant.

Published in Dawn, February 23rd, 2026