Project priority

This refers to the news report, ‘Country can’t afford loadshedding for long: Nawaz’ (September 17). How true. Is the government serious about minimising loadshedding through timely completion of various under-construction and ongoing power projects? It has not released funds allocated for a number of projects under the PSDP for the FY2015-16 despite the PM’s repeated directions to Wapda to complete the project on a war footing. The 969MW Neelum-Jhelum project has been allocated Rs11 billion during the current fiscal year but not a single penny has been released yet.
The Tarbela Fourth Extension Project (1,410MW) has been allocated Rs984 billion during FY2015-16. Likewise, the Golen Gol project (106MW) (Rs7.585 billion) and the Keyal Khwar project (122MW) has been allocated Rs2.134 billion during the FY2015-16. New hydropower projects such as the Dasu Dam (2,160MW) has been allocated Rs52.360 billion whereas the Diamer-Bhasha Dam (4,500MW) has been allocated Rs10 billion for land acquisition and Rs6 billion for the project. None of these projects have reportedly received any funds so far. One wonders what the priorities of the government are.
Hussain Siddiqui
Islamabad