ISLAMABAD, March 18: The Earthquake Rehabilitation and Reconstruction Authority will ensure construction of seismically resistant houses in the areas hit by the October 8 earthquake. ERRA Deputy Chairman Maj-Gen Nadeem Ahmed the Voice of America that the authority had been working on urban and rural housing, health, education, livelihood, roads and transport, water supply and sanitation, energy, industry and tourism, agriculture, environment, private sector development and employment.

He said strategies had been approved in the last meeting of the ERRA council headed by the prime minister about rural housing, health, education and cash grant component of livelihood. “We are in a position to launch these programmes from April 1,” he said.

He said that according to an agreement signed with the donors, those families whose houses were destroyed would get Rs175,000, while those with repairable homes would get Rs75,000.

He said the first instalment of Rs25,000 had been given and the next would be given after signing of memorandums of understanding with the owners.

He said teams would start visiting the affected areas from March 25 to assess the damage, after which a list would be sent to the headquarters for release of the compensation.

The provincial agency would release the amount in the bank or post office accounts of the earthquake survivors to make the process transparent, he said.

He said the survivors would get their homes reconstructed themselves.

The reconstruction of would be supervised so that the buildings were not built on the old pattern, he said.—APP