CHITRAL, Jan 24: The residents of Chitral have criticised appointment of non-locals on lower posts at the Pakistan Tourism Development Corporation hotel in Booni.

Syed Sardar Hussain Shah, former district general secretary of Pakistan People’s Party, said that sending peons, watchmen and other low ranking officials to Chitral from other was sheer injustice with the locals.

“Unemployment is on the rise in the district as there are no job opportunities in the private sector,” he said. Former MNA Maulana Abdul Akbar Chitrali said that more than 10 local employees at PTDC hotel in Booni had been working on contract for the last seven years and it was their right to be regularised.

He said that instead of regularising their services, PTDC appointed people of other districts on permanent basis and posted them in its Booni branch.Maulana Chitrali asked the PTDC authorities to regularise employees in all the four branches of the hotel in Chitral.

“They (the contractual employees) are working there and drawing only Rs7,000 monthly salary,” he added. He said that the new appointments were in violation of norms and merits as the posts were not advertised properly through newspapers. A senior official of PTDC, when contacted, confirmed fresh appointments and posting of non-locals peons and clerks at Booni branch.

He said that PTDC was controlled by the federal government and its employees could be posted anywhere in the country. “Chitralis have also been posted in PTDC branches in other districts,” he added.

Meanwhile, a woman died of suffocation in Golen valley here on Monday night. The poisonous gas produced by burning coal filled the room and claimed life of the woman, police said. Hassanullah, the husband of the deceased woman, is a policeman. —Correspondent