Mansehra: The Federal Minister of Religious Affairs, Sardar Mohammad Yusuf, said Saturday that Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s prime minister, Ali Amin Gandapur, had refused to accept the financial assistance of the federal government for the relief of the people affected by floods and the rehabilitation of infrastructure damaged in the province.
“Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif was scheduled to visit the areas affected by flood Circuit House house on the activities after calamity.
The meeting was attended by the Deputy Commissioner and the heads and officials of the relevant departments, Rescue 1122 and the municipal administrations of Tehsil.
The Federal Minister said that if the provincial government was not willing to receive federal funds, they should accelerate its own process of compensation and rehabilitation of persons.
“Up to 27 people lost lives in the cloud and sudden floods, with 20 dying in a single incident in the Haleem dehrai Neelband area. District administration requires RS433 million for compensation and rehabilitation, but the KP government has not yet released the money, to the misery of the victims of floods,” he said.
The minister said that houses, schools, roads, bridges and water schemes were destroyed by calamity in the Mansehra district, but the provincial government had not yet initiated rehabilitation and reconstruction activities.
“If the KP government leaves people at the mercy of hard climate and natural calamities, the federal government will intervene and extend all possible support to them,” he said.
Meanwhile, the municipal officer of BAFFA-PAKHAL TEHSIL MAZHAR MUZAFFAR AWAN, who also attended the meeting, told journalists that the search and rescue operation in the Haleem Dehrai Neelband area was completed after the recovery of the bodies of all 20 people swept by the floods of Flash.
Outsourcing of schools opposite: The provincial president of Tanzos de Tanzoseem, Dr. Mohammad Nasir, opposed the subcontracting of public schools in the province on Saturday and said that his master community would never accept the measure and prefer to resist it.
“Section 25-A of the 1973 Constitution links the State to provide free education to each child until the age of 16. If the government plans to privatize 4,140 schools throughout the province under the cover of the subcontracting, we will never accept it,” he told the journalists here.
Dr. Nasir said that his organization and other organizations that work for the rights of teachers and the promotion of education would devise a strategy if the government does not satisfy them on the subject.
“The government has approached us and other organizations with guarantees of a meeting to end this confusion. We are waiting for that summit and its result,” he said.
The teacher’s leader said that the Special Assistant of the Principal Minister in Education would soon schedule a meeting with the Minister of Schools Mian Saeedden Kakakhel, with the subcontracting of 4,140 schools, as announced by the Government, as the main agenda.
“We cannot allow the outsourcing of education to private operators. If the government tries to deliver the schools, we will evolve a joint strategy for resistance,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Association of Primary Teachers denounced the subcontracting of government schools and announced the launch of street protests against it.
“The teachers are against the privatization of the primary, high and superior secondary schools of the government, both for boys and girls, anywhere in the province under the outdoor attire, and we will never accept it at any cost,” said the president of the Aptic district, Attiz Mughal, to journalists.
Accompanied by other association leaders, Mughal said that Mansehra was also among the districts where the government had announced the subcontracting of schools.
Posted in Dawn, August 24, 2025
