PESHAWAR, Feb 10: Elected representatives of the Garam Chashma tehsil of Chitral have called upon of the federal and provincial governments to immediately address the problems facing the residents of the tehsil.

Addressing a press conference here on Friday, Nazim of Chitral Tehsil Sartaj Khan said that Garam Chashma is rich in mineral resources. Bordering Afghanistan, China and Uzbekistan, the area could become a second Gwadar if proper attention was paid to it, he added.

He said the government was earlier mulling the construction of Uzbekistan Highway, but the project was not pursued. He said the River Yamu in Uzbekistan was at a distance of only five hours from Garam Chashma through a jeepable road, which could be easily converted into a highway if the government paid attention to it.

Shereen Khan advocate, Nazim of UC Garam Chashma, said Chitral remained cut off from the rest of the country for six months due to snowfall, and his tehsil (Garam Chashma) remained cut off from Chitral.

“There is no concrete road to the tehsil,” he said, adding that the lone jeepable road is blocked even after a slight snowfall or low-intensity flood. For want of a bulldozer, the road remained closed for months,” he said.

“We, therefore, ask the federal and provincial governments to at least provide us a bulldozer so that the seasonal road could be converted into an all-season one,” he said.

The only tehsil headquarters hospital was also in a bad shape, he said. For the past many years, the hospital was being looked after by a single male doctor despite the fact that it had eight posts for male doctors, he said. A post of lady doctor had also been lying vacant for many years, he deplored.

Advocate Khan demanded of the government to provide the required number of male and female doctors to the hospital, besides proper equipment and necessary medicine.

It’s amazing that even in this modern age, most of the areas of the tehsil are deprived of electricity,” he said. President General Pervez Musharraf did make several announcements regarding the provision of electricity to every village and house of the district, but to no avail as yet, he added.

He said Chitral could produce at least 4,000MW cheap power.

“If the government pays attention to it, it will not only solve the electricity problem in Chitral, but will also serve to provide cheap electricity to other parts of the country,” he said, informing that the electricity requirement of the entire district was only 47MW.