Authorities urged to reopen road to Mansehra villages

MANSEHRA: People of Darra Shaynaya and adjoining localities have threatened to stage a protest demonstration if the lone road leading to their villages is not reopened for traffic.

“Darra Shaynaya-Oghi road, which had been blocked to traffic last month because of the land-sliding triggered by rains, couldn’t be cleared to traffic so far, causing trouble to local population,” former nazim Khalid Khan Tanoli told reporters in Oghi on Thursday.

A group of locals, led by Tanoli, said that Kamari-Banda section of Dara Shaynaya road was blocked last month following heavy boulders fell on it but neither the tehsil administration nor communications and works department cleared it to traffic.

“We cannot take our patients to hospitals and there is shortage of essential commodities in a wide population because of the blockade of the road,” said Tanoli.

He said that Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government had ordered the district administrations across the province to clear such roads blocked by land-sliding but to no avail.

The former nazim said that people had also met local lawmakers and department concerned and pleaded immediate reopening of the artery but they also didn’t pay heed to their request.

“If this road is not opened to traffic within a couple of days, we will take to the streets against it,” said Tanoli.