Broghil remains cut off from Chitral amid flash floods, rain

DC assures residents road would be reopened in a week

PESHAWAR: As the Pakistan Metrological Department (PMD) predicted further rains in parts of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, the miseries of people stuck on the closed Broghil-Yarkhoon Road in Chitral are set to increase.

The government has been unable to reopen the road which connects the Broghil district to the rest of the country.



The Met department has also warned of land-sliding in the upper parts of the province including Malakand and the Hazara division.

According to the Chitral district administration, flash floods had washed away around a 1,500-feet section of the Broghil-Yarkhoon Road on Monday disconnecting Broghil from the tehsil headquarters Mastuj. With communication cut off, it created food shortage in the area.

Five days on, the road is yet to be restored to allow stranded people to leave and to resume supply of daily commodities to the area.

Chitral Deputy Commissioner Shahab Hamid on Friday managed to visit Broghil where he assured residents that the road would be reopened before the Broghil Festival begins in early July.

According to the K-P Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA), labourers have been engaged to build a pedestrian track for residents of Broghil. After the track is built, a path for vehicles would be carved out of the mountainside.

Meanwhile, the district administration has dispatched 500 bags of wheat to Yarkhoon Lasht to address the food shortage in the area.



Heavy rainfall and land-sliding also damaged the Karakoram Highway at several locations on Wednesday. In Besham, in Shangla, land-sliding forcibly closed the KKH. It took officials 30 hours to clear it, as a massive traffic jam ensued on either side of the rock fall stranding hundreds of tourists who had been visiting Gilgit-Baltistan.

On Thursday, officials manage to clear the road enough to open one track to allow traffic to pass.

Similarly, Lowari Tunnel was also affected by an avalanche on Wednesday which damaged the Chitral-Dir Road. The road, however, was cleared the next day and the tunnel was reopened for traffic.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 1^st, 2017.