Tourists whine about costly boating

Say Khanpur Dam site lacks basic facilities including public toilets

HARIPUR:

Tourists visiting Khanpur Dam have complained about lack of facilities and costly fares of boat riding.

Muhammad Ramzan, a tourist from Faisalabad, told The Express Tribune that the tourist site is more expensive than Murree as a five-minute ride on a small boat with six seats costs Rs1,200 while Rs2,500 was being charged for a 15-minute ride.

He said that fish vendors also charge at their will. The tourist from Faisalabad, who also visited the destination with his children last year, said that the boat fare has doubled.

Another tourist, Usman, a resident of Islamabad, said that though the site is the nearest picnic spot for the residents of the capital, “the lack of facilities makes it difficult for the tourists to spend time here”.

“There is neither a suitable place to sit nor a public toilet. The tourist site is also without a protected boundary,” he said, adding that the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa government needed to pay attention to the overlooked and discounted tourist destination.

Sources in the district administration said that former assistant commissioner Adil Ayub had fixed the fare in consultation with the boat owners, but after his transfer, the owners started charging fares at will.

Boat owners’ association official Mohammad Hanif said that the boat owners have severely been dented by the coronavirus pandemic.

He said that the constant rising petrol and diesel prices have led to the slash in the share of the boat owners’ profit.

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Sources in the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Tourism Department said that three years ago, a festival took place at the dam spot but because of security reasons, no festival could be held for the last five years.

Sources said that a project for the provision of clean drinking water and toilets was planned, however, it could not be completed.

The sources said that a local woman has also laid the ownership claim of the land on the banks of the dam and the case is pending in the Supreme Court. The woman has also made WAPDA a respondent in the case which has led to several legal issues.

A local senior citizen, Babu Mohammad Irshad, said that daily disputes occur over the car parking fee that had been done away with by the district administration earlier.

He said that because of the lack of safety measures, many people drown every year during boat capsizing incidents.

He said that there were no fences around the dam and people often swim, which is one of the main causes of deaths every year.

Boating in Khanur Dam was banned after the Tarbela lake accident in which about 50 people died. However, permission was later granted after the registration of boats. An estimated 200,000 tourists visited the dam site during Eidul Azha.

Tourists have demanded to set up shops along the bank of the dam besides making seating arrangements so that the maximum number of tourists could visit the site.

Haripur Additional Deputy Commissioner (ADC) Ali Sher Khan said that they have imposed section 144 at Khanpur Dam and the boat owners are being bound to implement SOPs.

He said that riding old boats in the dam wasn’t permitted. ADC said that they also inspected the boating stand at Khanpur dam and Khanpur stream on the orders of the deputy commissioner.

He added that two stands were sealed for violating SOPs while several people were arrested and handed over to the police for violating restrictions. Khan said that the people must follow SOPs at the recreational spots.

She added that there was a ban on illegal boating and only those registered with the police and administration were allowed to run the service.

They would soon start action against the profiteers and devise rates for boat riding after consulting with the service owners, said Khan.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 10^th, 2021.