CHITRAL, April 19: The course of the River Chitral was diverted on Thursday to save the Chitral-Booni Road in Denin from being washed away.

Executive engineer of the communication and works department, Chitral, Arif Khan Work opened the course diversion by driving a bulldozer.

The river was diverted to a long channel dug up by the C&W department in front of Balach village at a cost of Rs2m.

Speaking on the occasion, Mr Arif said the course diversion would give the department more time to build protection wall around the Denin road destroyed by river water and rehabilitate it.

He said a large part of the road was washed away by the river last summer and its completion erosion into the water this summer was feared. He said erosion occurred, then upper part of Chitral would have disconnected from its district headquarters.

The executive engineer said the road connected Chitral with Gilgit-Baltistan via Shandur Pass and provided linkage to the strategically important Baroghil area.

He said the road also provided links to Torkhow, Mulkhow, Yarkhun, Laspur, Oveer and Golen valleys, which attracted a large number of tourists in summer.

Mr Arif said keeping in view the gravity of the situation, the chief minister had approved a fund of Rs49 million for erecting protection wall and rehabilitation work which would be used before the rising of water level in summer. He said Rs9.8 million would be spent for reconstruction of Chitral-Booni Road washed away by floods two years ago near Reshun village. — Correspondent