Senate wants monthly payouts to terror victims’ kin

PML-N senator says govt did not compensate the families who lost members to terrorism

ISLAMABAD:

The upper house of parliament on Tuesday adopted a resolution which, citing the sorry state of families of those killed in terror incidents, pressed the federal government to take care of these families by offering them a uniform compensation package.

The resolution was moved by the ruling Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz’s (PML-N) Senator Nisar Muhammad from the militancy-hit province of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P).



“The house recommends that the government should evolve a mechanism to take care of the said families and provide them reasonable financial assistance on a monthly basis to enable them to meet their needs of daily life and lead respectable lives,” the resolution said.

Talking to The Express Tribune, Nisar said it is strange to see that the government is running laptop distribution schemes and Benazir Income Support Programme but there is no policy or scheme for the welfare of terror victims.

Senator Nisar said like the previous governments, his party had also done nothing for the welfare of such victims.  There is no consolidated or uniform criterion to pay compensation to families of the deceased or the injured, he said.

“I personally know such families whose bread earners became victim of terrorism and the rest of their family members were left at the mercy of the Almighty,” Nisar said, adding that state did not compensate them.

He cited the example of seven sisters who have no other source of income after their brother became a victim of terror. The Rs0.2 million compensation announced for them by the provincial government would not be enough for them, he said.



“I’ve also written a letter to Finance Minister Ishaq Dar and told him that if we do not compensate these families then the orphaned children will have no other option but to join the ranks of the suicide brigade,” the senator added.

He said the federal government received billions of rupees of coalition funds but it was doing nothing for the welfare of these families.

Nisar said he has reminded the federation of its constitutional commitment, as the Constitution says, “it shall be the duty of the federation to protect every province against external aggression and internal disturbances and to ensure that the government of every province is carried on in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution.”



He said the current situation was not just a matter of law and order but one of external aggression as militants were carrying out their activities with the assistance of their foreign masters and killing the innocent citizens of Pakistan.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 30^th, 2015.