PESHAWAR, Oct 28: The NWFP government has expressed its inability to the federal authorities to provide for the resettling of some of the Tarbela dam affected families, official sources told Dawn.

The federal ministry for water and power, in a letter to the provincial government, had asked for details about the 2,607 acres the province had earlier identified in Dera Ismail Khan district for distribution among the Tarbela dam affected families.

The authorities had been asked to provide details of the exact location of the available land, its price - for the purposes of paying the same by the federal authorities concerned - and other information relevant to the land.

However, in a letter sent on Oct 6, 2001, the provincial authorities, said the sources, had informed the federal water and power ministry that the land identified for the affected could not be utilized for the same purpose.

The 2,607 acres, identified in Dera Ismail Khan district, formed part of the over 17,500 acres of the provincial government owned land that was being allotted to the Pakistan army.

“As the (2,607 acres earlier designated for the Tarbela dam families) forms part of the 17,500 acres being acquired by the army hence the same land could not be distributed among the affected families,” said a high-ranking officer.

Over 1,000 families, among the large numbers of families who lost their ancestral lands and homes to the mega dam project, from the Haripur district and its adjoining Kala Dhaka area, in the NWFP, are awaiting resettlement and alternate land even after over 25 years after the project became operational in the mid-1970s.

Under pressure from the World Bank, which had conditioned its over US$300 million loan for the Ghazi Barotha Hydro Project with the resettlement of the remaining affected families of the Tarbela dam project, Islamabad, has been trying for over one year to resolve the issue.

But to its utter dismay and despite repeated instructions to the NWFP, Punjab and Sindh provinces the issue remains to be settled.

Apart from the NWFP’s 2,607 acres, federal government also wanted Punjab and Sindh to jointly specify over 20,000 acres to resettle the families, said the sources.

“The WB loan hangs in the balance as federal government is finding difficult to arrange the land for resettling the affected families,” said the sources.