First shelter home to be operational next week

Rawalpindi : The local management has finalised all arrangements to open first ‘Panagah’ also called 'Shelter Home’ in the city at the Fowara Chowk parking plaza under control of Rawalpindi Development Authority (RDA) next week. Punjab Chief Minister Usman Buzdar will inaugurate the ‘Panagah.’

It is worth mentioning here that needy people will be provided three times meal free of cost in ‘Panagah’. There will be RDA staff members, Civil Defence staff and a medical camp round the clock to help needy people.

The local management, Rawalpindi has installed 12 CCTV cameras around the ‘Panagah’, where 600 people (male and female) could live. The management has established four toilets for males and two toilets for females at the shelter home. The management has strictly ordered to remove all kinds of encroachments all around the ‘Panagah’ to avoid any untoward incident. The RDA Chairman, Arif Abbasi, Deputy Commissioner Dr Umar Jahangir, City Police Officer (CPO) Abbas Ahsen and several other high ranking officers visited ‘Panagah’. They have showed complete satisfaction on the arrangements.

The City’s First ‘Panagah’ In-Charge Muhammad Rafiq Qadri told ‘The News’ that they have finalised all arrangements to start the shelter home which will be inaugurated by the chief minister next week.

He said that there is a ‘Bio-Metric’ system in ‘Panagah’. On the directions of Punjab chief minister, we will provide three times meal to needy people free of cost in ‘Panagah’.

We have established ‘Panagah’ for the needy people who could not afford rooms in hotels. We will never allow anybody to settle in ‘Panagah’ permanently,” he added. He said that several people come to Rawalpindi for several works and could not afford rooms in hotels. They could live in the shelter home easily,” he added. “We have closed all gates of parking plaza at Fowara Chowk. People will come and go through a single gate, he said. The RDA has allocated ground floor of the parking plaza to make ‘Panagah’ while other floors will be used for parking as per routine,” he added.