K-P to provide wheat flour at subsidised rate

Cabinet voices concern over reduction of NA seats

PESHAWAR:

The Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) cabinet Thursday decided to provide subsidized flour to the public at the rate of Rs980 per 20kg bag and Rs490 per 10kg bag during the current month, which will involve a subsidy of Rs30 billion.

Sales points and shops will be established and specified across the province to provide atta to the public on subsidized rates. Wheat supply to the flour mills too will be started this month.

The decision was taken at a cabinet meeting presided over by Chief Minister Mahmood Khan and attended by the provincial chief secretary, senior member board of revenue, additional chief secretary and secretaries of government departments.

Minister for Higher Education Kamran Khan Bangash told reporters in a post-cabinet briefing that the cabinet also approved the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Medical Officers of Health Department (Regularization of Services) Bill, 2022 to regularize 675 contract doctors.

The provincial cabinet, he said, also sanctioned regularization of the remaining 210 project employees of the Livestock Department in the erstwhile FATA. Similarly, the cabinet okayed the creation of 34 IT-cadre posts in the Excise & Taxation Department. The regularization of 296 employees of the community based CDLD project in Malakand was also approved.

Read Cabinet okays relief package, wheat policy

The minister said the absorption of 33 khasadars and 77 levies of South Waziristan and Lakki Marwat in the police was also given the go-ahead.

The cabinet, he added, approved additional funds of Rs265 million for the ongoing Greater Water Supply Schemes Mingora and Kohat under cities improvement project.

Similarly, a sum of Rs200 million as seed money was approved to set up fund for the development of wildlife and national parks. The cabinet permitted a grant-in-aid of Rs200 million for the University of Chitral (UoC).

The cabinet voiced concern over reduction in the number of National Assembly seats in the K-P which, it noted, should have been increased further on the basis of population ratio.

The cabinet, he said, also expressed annoyance over the alleged alteration in the voter lists. In case the alterations are not stopped, then the judiciary will be approached in this regard, he informed media-men.

The meeting also approved the posting of Asad Ali, District & Sessions Judge as Judge, Anti-Terrorism Court, Swat as recommended by the Peshawar High Court chief justice.

The minister said that the establishment of Community Game Reserve in the districts of Malakand, Hangu and Lakki Marwat had been approved. The areas declared as Community Managed Game Reserves include Degar Raj (District Malakand), Chamba Gul (District Hangu) and Qimat Manji Wala (Laki Marwat).

The cabinet also approved the use of forest land for the provision of clean drinking water to the people in Shakardara, Kohat.

To overcome the growing pollution in Peshawar, the cabinet approved the formation of an oversight and implementation committee comprising three ministers and MPAs from Peshawar as well as secretaries of relevant departments and environmental authority.

Provincial Ministers Taimur Salim Jhagra, Kamran Khan Bangash and Ishtiaq Urmar will be part of the committee.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 3^rd, 2022.