The provincial cabinet of NWFP on Wednesday decided to move federal government for writing off the taxes and loans of the residents of the flood hit districts of the province. The provincial government would also exempt them of taxes through declaring it calamity-hit areas.
The meeting of the provincial cabinet held here with Chief Minister Akram Khan Durrani in chair attended by the ministers, chief secretary and administrative secretaries of the various department decided that chief minister himself would take up the matter with Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz.
Briefing newsmen regarding decisions taken during the cabinet meeting, NWFP Minister for Information, Asif Iqbal Daudzai informed the newsmen that during meeting, Relief Commissioner NWFP Fazal Rabi briefed the cabinet regarding the losses incurred in the province due to the flash floods of the monsoon rains. He told the meeting that the estimated loss of both public and private properties stands at Rs 2 billion in the province.
Giving break up of the losses, flash floods have rendered 210 death casualties and 158 injured in different districts of the province of whom four are stated to be Afghan refugees. 21,977 houses were completely and partially damaged. The floods also played havoc with communication system as 76 roads were completely destroyed while 167 water supply schemes were also damaged.
The cabinet was informed that the flash floods also caused a loss of Rs 21.50 million due to creating leakage in the watercourses and canals while spur washed away incurred a loss of Rs 265 million. The cabinet was informed that according to estimation, roads worth Rs 739.2 million, bridges Rs 197.396 million and water supply schemes have incurred a loss of Rs 33 million in the recent flash floods in the province.
The information minister said that provincial government for provision of emergency relief assistance amended the Relief Act immediately and announced a compensation of Rs 0.1 million for every death casualty. The families of 202 victims had already received the compensation amount. Similarly, he said that 158 injured have been given a compensation of Rs 50, 000 each.
The provincial government, the information minister said, through amendments in the Relief Act has also increased compensation for complete and partial destroyed houses and have given Rs 25,000 and Rs 10,000, respectively. The compensation for the dead cattle heads had also been increased. The provincial government, he said had released an amount of Rs 28.1 million and amount of Rs 57 million for others affected people.
The government, Daudzai said had also sanctioned an amount of Rs 50 million for the repairment and reconstruction of spurs and bridges while Rs 50 million allocated for the restoration of the means of communication. The provincial cabinet has further approved an amount of Rs 30 million for the purchase of machinery for cleaning of roads to use it in emergency situation in future. Similarly, Rs 20 million has been sanctioned for the purchase of de-watering pumps. "Each district would have at least two de-watering pumps."
In emergency relief, the provincial government, he said had distributed 11,275 tents, 27,400 blankets, 2,000 kilograms cooking oil and 2,300 kilograms sugar and other edibles among the affected people of the different districts.
In Mardan City, he said 931 shops stored with goods worth millions of rupees have also been destroyed. The provincial government, he said had decided to provide a compensation of Rs 50,000 per shop, while federal government would also be requested to put its share in the relief amount of the provincial government.
Comments
Comments are closed.