Dilapidated school building poses threat to lives

Locals say winter season is around corner and there will be more rains

HARIPUR:

The lives of students and teachers at the Government Middle School Ballah Srikot are at risk as the repair work on the dilapidated building hasn’t started yet.

The school building was already in a bad shape and the heavy downpours have caused severe damage to the boundary wall of the educational institution.

Locals Asmat Shah, Anwar Shah Mashwani and Aqil Shah said that this is the area and native village of some influential officials and despite that they don’t pay attention to rebuilding the school.

The locals were of the view that the provincial government spends billions of rupees on the education of girls but not spending money on rebuilding or repairing the building.

"School officials do not visit this area because it is far from Haripur. The officials of the central office of the education department are aware of the school's condition but they are not paying any heed to the issue," said Shah. Winter season is around the corner and there will be more rains, he said, adding that it is feared that the school building will be further damaged.

Officials in charge of the education department told The Express Tribune that they have written a letter to the authority concerned for funds for the repair work. After the approval, the repair of the boundary wall will start, he added.

The Provincial Meteorological Center Peshawar on Tuesday predicted mainly partly cloudy weather in most parts of the province during the next 24 hours.

However, it said that isolated rain-thunderstorm with gusty winds are likely to occur in Abbottabad, Mansehra, Battagram, Torghar and Kohistan. During the last 23 hours, the weather remained mainly partly cloudy in most parts of the province.

Labourer stripped naked

A young labourer was tormented after being stripped naked in Pind Muneem area of Khanpur on Tuesday.

The police said that a drug dealer and his accomplices mercilessly tortured the young boy, stripped him of his clothes, and filmed his videos which went viral on social media. Soon after the incident, District Police Officer Haripur himself took notice of the video and directed officials concerned to register a case against the accused. However, the affected labourer is yet to contact the police or file any complaint against the accused, said SHO Khanpur Changzeb. Moreover, he said that he along with other police personnel under the supervision of DSP Circle Khanpur Jamilur Rehman traced the suspects and arrested two of them.

 

Published in The Express Tribune, October 5^th, 2022.