Rehabilitation: AJK govt to construct houses for refugees

The Azad Jammu and Kashmir government has purchased 320 kanals in Thota to construct houses for Kashmiri refugees.

MUZAFFARABAD:

The Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) government has purchased 320 kanals on Chakothi Road in Thota to construct houses for Kashmiri refugees.

Around 730 families that migrated to AJK from Indian Kashmir in 1989 have been living in makeshift tents in Chela Bandi, Muzaffarabad since then.

AJK Minister for Rehabilitation Abdul Majid Khan told The Express Tribune that Rs260 million would be spent on the housing scheme. He said that the sum has been provided by the Kuwaiti government to help rehabilitate the refugees.

“We will immediately purchase corrugated galvanised iron (CGI) sheets to provide them to the refugees living in the tents until the Thota Housing Scheme is completed,” the minister said.

He said that nobody will be able to sell these CGI sheets in the market because the department of rehabilitation will mark them with a special insignia.

“More than 40 Kashmiri refugees have been offered appointment letters to join the police  under the six per cent quota that has been allocated to the 1989 refugees. “The government is committed to ensuring quota implementation,” Khan said.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 5^th, 2014.