Residents Of Arandu Urge Provision Of Basic Amenities; Deplores 'apathy' Of KP Govt

The residents of far flung village of Arandu, here on the border of Pakistan and Afghanistan, regardless of their political, religious affiliations on Thursday staged a peaceful demonstration and Jirga and urged of the provincial government to provide them basic amenities.

CHITRAL, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 15th Dec, 2022 ) :The residents of far flung village of Arandu, here on the border of Pakistan and Afghanistan, regardless of their political, religious affiliations on Thursday staged a peaceful demonstration and Jirga and urged of the provincial government to provide them basic amenities.

The village is situated on the banks of Landai Sin River just above its confluence with the Kunar River and lies on the border with Kunar Province, Afghanistan.

Speaking on the occasion Nazim Abdul Majeed and local elders said that UC Arundu has a total population of 25,000 in five village councils. He also complained about the acute shortage of technology in the area.

The people of the valley had played the role of a front-line force in the war against terror, he said He said the construction of Arandu road started some time ago but it was left unfinished and still 32 km of the road was unpaved.

Similarly, he claimed that there was no healthcare facility in the valley and the only Primary health center which was upgraded in 2009 as Rural Health Center (RHC) but lacked basic facilities of treatment as no doctor visited the area in two months.

He deplored that one local medical technician purportedly was running the entire health center and examines the patients.

He said that despite repeated complaints and requests the provincial government and district government did not take any notice in resolving the issue.

Similarly, he pointed out that the number of teachers at the high school of Arundu was very less, while the higher secondary school was closed long time ago.

The Nazim said that the area was deprived of mobile phone and internet service in this age of technology when students were getting online education across the globe, the students Arundu were deprived of this basic facility and disconnected from the rest of the country and the world.

"There is no drinking water scheme for the area," he said and added that the Public Health Engineering department of KP government had allegedly embezzled millions of rupees. He said that all the development works were on paper and there was nothing on the ground.

On this occasion, the speakers also thanked the Pakistan Army, which had constructed the children's park in Arandu and continues to cooperate with the people in other works.

The speakers criticized KP forest department for allegedly not recruiting the local people on merit to protect the forest areas.