Jail admin finds jirga more effective than law

Source Dawn

The administration of Kohat jail has resorted to traditional way of convening a jirga to defuse sectarian tension among prisoners instead of taking legal action against the inmates, who clashed with each other two day ago, according to well-placed sources.

Seventeen prisoners were injured when Shia and Sunni inmates of the jail clashed on Sunday over chalking of controversial slogans on the walls of jail barracks.
“After ending the fighting, SSP Atiqullah Wazir, DSP Ihsanullah Khan, jail superintendent Aitezaz Jadoon, other senior officials and representatives of Shia and Sunni prisoners held a jirga to find out solution to the ongoing sectarian tension in the prison,” sources said.
The prisoners assured the administration that they would not indulge in wall chalking, which hurt the feelings of the rival sect, and live together peacefully in future.
The administration also cleared the wall chalking, which caused clash between the two groups of prisoners, and decided to search the inmates every month to confiscate illegal items from them.
The jail staff also recovered sharp edge tools and knives, made from cutting ghee tins, from both the groups of prisoners.
The district administration deployed 20 more policemen to monitor activities of the prisoners. It had already detailed 20 policemen for security of the jail earlier due to shortage of prisoner staff.
Meanwhile, the injured prisoners were discharged from hospitals and sent back to their lockups on Monday.
It is worth mentioning that local journalists received phone calls from prisoners, belonging to both groups, after the clashes. The prisoners spread rumours about killing of their colleagues. They also said that jail administration started clean-up operation in the prison. However, prison authorities denied the reports.Sources said that prisoners were not only possessing cellular phones but hashish was also sold in the jail openly. The prisoners used to talk to their families and friends by cellular phones and also ran drug business, a jail official confided.

Power politics seen behind Kohat power woes

Source Dawn

The electricity consumers in the city are facing long outages and persistent low voltage problem due to delay in completion of the Kohat Development Authority (KDA) township grid station project, which was approved in 2004 to divide the load among three parts of the city.

When contacted, officials of Peshawar Electric Supply Company (Pesco) told this correspondent that the city III part had been the worst affected by loadshedding because of sharing the additional burden of KDA town and some other areas.
They said that there was only one grid station built in 1973 for the city whereas the load had tripled since then. Many new towns had emerged in the city`s surroundings, but no new grid was built for the burgeoning population.
During investigations, it was revealed that of the two grid stations approved for Kohat one had been built in Bannu on the orders of former chief minister Mohammad Akram Durrani of the JUI-F and another at Daudkhel in Punjab.
Keeping in view the demand of people, the government had approved a grid station for the KDA township in 2004, which was expected to be completed in 2006.
The KDA had allotted 50 kanals to the Water and Power Development Authority (Wapda) for the new 132-KV grid station, which raised the hopes for the solution to the long-standing problem of low voltage in KDA township, Kohat city comprising six sub-divisions, Darra Adamkhel and Hangu.
But work on the project had not been completed as yet while former state minister for water and power Amir Muqam had repeatedly said that funds were approved for the project.
When contacted, technical staff of Pesco said that normally a grid station was energized within six months, but the KDA project had been lying pending for the last seven years.
The consumers are suffering power outages in addition to the routine loadshedding of over 10 hours, as parliamentarians in connivance with the officials have been doing politics over the provision of electricity and transformers to different areas. The officials said that power breakdowns were being caused because the present system could not bear load and dozens of transformers were needed in the city and rural areas to overcome the problem.
Consumers are being told to contact their elected representatives for provision of more transformers to ensure smooth power supply.
According to an official at the city complaint office, Kohat city had been divided into three parts and the extra load had been shared by the city-III part, which was the main reason for frequent power disruptions in the area.
He said that each of the two phases of the city near Bannu gate and government public school tripped more than five times a day and the removal of fault during odd hours took two to three hours.
A few months ago, MNA Pir Dilawar Shah inaugurated a 200-KV transformer in Bazaar-i-Mustafa on people`s demand. However, after a fortnight the Pesco officials removed the transformer and when people complained to the MNA he reportedly also ordered the removal of the inauguration plaque from the site.
Similarly, consumers have been asked to collect money for buying and installation of heavy transformer in the Hindu mohallah chowk after the parliamentarians refused to approve it for them.

Firecrackers injure three children

Source Dawn

Three children received injuries when abandoned firecrackers exploded in Muslimabad area here on Wednesday.

The Bomb Disposal Squad said that a huge quantity of firecrackers was left abandoned at a garbage dump. The children found the firecrackers and started playing with them, they said. They added that the firecrackers exploded and injuring three children.
The injured children included six-year-old Najad Khan, nine-year-old Majid and minor Munsif. They were shifted to women and children hospital, where doctors said they were in stable condition.
Meanwhile, the anti-corruption department caught the assistant director of Kohat Development Authority red-handed while taking bribe on Wednesday.

Hangu blast death toll hits 38

Source The News


Death toll in the Hangu suicide bombing rose to 38 as two more among the injured succumbed to their injuries and another four bodies were recovered from the debris of the collapsed buildings on Friday, local sources said.

The sources said the number of those injured in the bombing stood at 56. The injured were under treatment at a number of hospitals in Hangu, Kohat and Peshawar. Conditions at the government hospital in Hangu were stated to be inadequate to cope with the rush of the injured on the day of the blast.

As many as 30 shops, hotels, the building of the Hangu Press Club, the offices of a private cellular company, district courts and a police station were destroyed in the deadly explosion. Scenes of destruction were still evident all over the place a day after the explosion.

Residents lamented the slow pace of rescue work and the government’s indifference to their plight. They pointed out that only one excavator and one tractor-trolley were available for the rescue operation.

The people doing rescue work and visiting the place to see the destruction mostly blamed outsiders for the blast and said inimical powers were trying to harm Pakistan. Out of fear or other reasons, not many people were blaming the Taliban for the attack even though they had claimed responsibility for the bombing.

District Coordination Officer Abdul Rasheed said that a black pick-up vehicle carrying 600 kilograms of explosives was used in the bombing. He said the vehicle had come from Thall to Hangu and clues had been found to hunt down the perpetrators of the sabotage act. The official said the owner of the vehicle had been identified and the engine had been found.

Abdul Rasheed said Hangu was surrounded by three tribal agencies due to which the militants were taking shelter there after carrying out acts of subversion. He said security had been beefed up to check the activities of anti-state elements and prevent repetition of such incidents.

Meanwhile, Ehsanullah Ehsan, a spokesman for the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan threatened to continue attacking government installations. He warned the people to avoid milling around government offices. He had earlier claimed responsibility for the Hangu bombing.

ANALYSIS: FATA University — a long way to go

Source Daily Times

by Farhat Taj


Reportedly, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government has approved the establishment of a university in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA). The estimated cost of the project is three billion rupees. The university will be constructed in the frontier region (FR) of Kohat, a part of FATA.

One should cautiously welcome the move. This is a long overdue development. A university and other institutions of higher education should have been established in FATA decades ago. But there are some important issues in the way of the coming into being of the university as well as its functioning as a seat of learning, if and when it comes into being.

In the near past, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government made a move to establish two universities in FATA, one in the Sunni-dominated town of Sadda in Kurram and the other in the Shia-dominated town of Parachinar in Kurram. The then vice chancellor of the Islamic College, Peshawar, visited both towns in connection with the ongoing work for the establishment of the universities. Two government buildings, one each in Parachinar and Sadda, were acquired and staff was recruited. Even the students’ admission process began on both campuses. Suddenly, the FATA secretariat refused to hand over the government buildings in Parachinar and Sadda for university purposes. The tribal leaders from Kurram said that due to pressure from “vested interests” in the FATA secretariat, the government abandoned the whole plan. Keeping in view this event, one wonders whether the newly announced university will ever become a reality.

The new university is in the initial stages of paperwork. A PC-1 has yet to be produced and the site for construction has to be arranged for in the region. It may take a long time before it is built. But the biggest hurdle is the poor security in FATA. The Taliban as well as Pakistan Army have bombed countless schools in FATA. The two have also occupied the buildings of educational institutions in the tribal areas that have been converted into bases for the security forces or the Taliban. The Government Degree College in Darra Adam Khel has been occupied by the security forces for the last three years and no educational activity has taken place since then. The most precious state property in FR Kohat, the Kohat tunnel, built with Japanese cooperation, has been attacked more than once by the Taliban.

It may take some years before the university building is constructed. One may like to hope that by that time the security situation would have been improved in FATA and, consequently, the university will not be harmed. Unfortunately, this hope seems to be very frail at least at this point in time. The insecurity in FATA is not merely a function of internal tribal dynamics. It is caused by and linked to powerful external factors concerning the ongoing war on terror in the wider Af-Pak region. There are no clear prospects of the end of the war on terror at this point in time. Will the university be established even if security does not improve in the years to come? Economically, it is not a viable idea to build the university to be bombed by the Taliban or the security forces, or occupied by one of them and the subsequent misuse of the building. Above all, with many, if not most, people in FATA living as internally displaced people (IDPs) outside the tribal areas, who will study in the university?

Freedom of thought and expression are part and parcel of productive scholarly activity in a university. Dr Pervez Hoodhboy, a well-know scholar and social activist in Pakistan has been arguing that the Pakistani educational system, shaped by deeply conservative social and cultural values, discourages critical thinking. This is largely because of the systematic state encouragement of narrow religious ideas at the cost of critical thinking at all levels of the state, including public educational institutions. State encouragement of narrow religious ideas has always been one step ahead in FATA due to its strategic location near Afghanistan.

Moreover, FATA stands excluded from the formal legal framework of Pakistan, including the fundamental rights guaranteed in the constitution of Pakistan. Will the state authorities, civil and military, based in FATA allow genuine freedom of thought and expression in the area? They have been encouraging bigoted religious thought by suppressing any alternative ideas. In the last few years, some people from Bajaur told me that they had been stopped by the political authorities from starting a monthly magazine from the area to spread human rights and secular ideas. It would be, thus, appropriate to end the legal isolation of FATA before the university began to work. This would remove the unchallengeable powers of the state authorities to hinder freedom of thought and expression in FATA.

One must note that non-Muslim (Sikh and Hindu) and ethnic (Kurram Punjabis) minorities have been peacefully living in FATA for generations. This suggests that, historically, the people of FATA have had a tradition of peacefully coexisting with other ideas and value systems. Moreover, Ghaffar Khan’s non-violent movement, that aimed to unite the tribes on the lines of modern social organisation, has also had an impact on FATA. These two attributes of the tribal areas stand intact, although violated in the ongoing militancy. These indigenous attributes, if bolstered by a supportive state environment, would hopefully encourage freedom of thought and expression leading to critical thinking in the proposed tribal seat of learning.

The third issue concerns all the universities in Pakistan and will affect the would be university in FATA as well if the appropriate academic considerations are not taken care of. Dr Hoodhboy has long been elaborating that university education in Pakistan is far behind international standards. Most of the research papers written by Pakistani authors have zero citation in the global research community. Teachers and students of Pakistani universities are considered backward by international standards in terms of basic subject understanding.

In this dismal context, it is important that the educational authorities in FATA make all necessary allowances for better academic planning and management in the proposed FATA University so that it becomes a high standard seat of learning rather than just another public university in Pakistan that counts for nothing significant in international scholarly circles.

17 prisoners injured in Kohat jail sectarian clash

Source Pakistan Observer


Seventeen prisoners were injured in a sectarian clash in Kohat Jail on Sunday, police said. The clash started at 8:00am when the prisoners belonging to Sunni and Shia sects exchanged hot words over some issue. Seventeen prisoners were injured in the clash who were shifted to the hospital situated inside the jail premises for treatment. Heavy contingents of police soon reached the jail and brought the situation under control. The injured included 10 from the Shia sect and seven from the Sunni sect, who belong to Kohat, Hangu, Orakzai Agency and Tirah Valley. A local jirga was negotiating with the prisoners to settle the dispute.

Three shot dead for honour in Kohat

Source Dawn

Three persons, including two women, were killed in two separate incidents in the name of honour here on Saturday, police said.

According to police in the first incident, the father and brother of a 24-year-old married woman along with two other armed men entered into a house in Jabar area of Gumbat police station on Rawalpindi road.
They sprayed the woman and her husband Farhatullah with bullets for marrying without the consent of her family. The attackers managed to escape, police said, adding they were declared proclaimed offenders.
The residents said that both the victims had recently married in a court in Karachi and were receiving threats. They were living in Karachi for last many years and recently shifted to Jabar for the safety of their lives, they said.
Police said that the attackers also came from Karachi to kill the couple. The Gumbat police registered murder cases against the accused on the complaint of the mother of Farhatullah and launched investigations.
Meanwhile, the husband and brother of a woman shot her dead inside her home in Darrewal Banda, police said.
They alleged that the brother and husband of the woman killed but they were trying to portray it as case of blind murder.
The Riaz Khan police station registered cases against the accused after arresting them and launched investigations.

Kohat University 45 PhD Scholars Face Uncertain Future

Source Dawn



The future of 45 scholars of Kohat University of Science and Technology, studying abroad, hangs in the balance owing to unusual delay in the payment of fourth year expenses of their extended PhD programme by Higher Education Commission.
The scholars, through a letter, brought the matter in the notice of university administration few months ago and requested for more payment besides demanding extension in leaves. Their three-year leaves expired last year.
The KUST syndicate resolved the problem of their extended stay by approving their leaves. The vice-chancellor, who was in constant contact with the officials concerned, hoped that HEC would save the future of the students and make payment without further delay keeping in view the serious nature of the case.
The KUST had taken up the issue with HEC two months ago and demanded of it Rs7 million as payment of last year fees of the scholars, who were pursuing their PhDs in Germany and United Kingdom.
According to sources, KUST had sent 26 scholars to UK and 19 to Germany for three-year PhD programme. The university and the HEC had signed three years agreement with the foreign universities concerned. The monthly fees in pound sterling were being regularly sent to the scholars for the last three years and their visas were also refreshed every year.
The director finance of KUST, Amjad, when contacted, confirmed that the scholars were facing financial problems. “The PhD programme was originally approved for three year according to PC-1 document. The universities had said that they offered three years PhD programme after which the agreement was duly signed between HEC and the universities,” he said.
But unfortunately the three years programme was converted into four years owing to delay in approval of thesis of students by their supervisors, he added.
The universities demanded payment for the fourth year and made it clear that if fees were not paid the students would not be granted degrees and the UK and Germany governments would have to deport them.
The 12th meeting of the syndicate of KUST approved the extended leaves of the 45 students and informed the foreign universities that payment was in the pipeline and would be made very soon. The approval to the extended leaves was made fortnight back.
The HEC had told KUST last year that according to PC-1 it had cleared all the payment for three years and was not in a position to bear expenses for the extended period.
Amjad said that the students required payment up to October 2011 to complete and submit their thesis but for further payment HEC and KUST would have to prepare fresh PC-1 if the former agreed to bear the expenses. The HEC had not made any decision about more payment as yet and the matter was being regularly taken up by KUST to save the future of the teachers, who had been sent for PhD.
Another official at the university regretted that owing to drastic cut in HEC budget and its uncertain future, it was very difficult to make such a huge payment.
Moreover, the decision to devolve HEC to provinces was also not clear therefore payment of fees of the scholars seemed almost impossible for the time being, he added.

Two people killed in kohat

Source Dawn

Two people, including a proclaimed offender, were gunned down in Bazid and Lal Garhi areas on Friday.
Unknown armed men killed the proclaimed offender, Ameer Zaman, in Baszid Khel and fled the scene. The son of the deceased, Ajmal, told the Riaz Khan Shaheed police his father was killed by unidentified people. In Lal Garhi, Mohammad Siddique was shot dead by two men, the police said. The police arrested the accused nominated in the FIR.

Five killed, 17 injured in two Kohat incidents

Source The News
Five persons were killed and 17 others sustained injuries in two separate incidents in the district on Monday, sources said.

The sources said Gul Nawaz, Adil Nawaz and Wazir Akbar drowned while swimming in a lake in Sheraki area in Darra Adamkhel. The locals retrieved the bodies after hectic efforts and shifted Wazir Akbar to Liaqat Memorial Hospital in Kohat while Gul Nawaz and Adil died instantly.

Meanwhile, two passengers died and 16 others were injured when a pickup (C-1883) overturned while negotiating a sharp turn near Sherkot on Kohat-Hangu Road. Two passengers identified as Lal Qasim and Aqeed Ali were killed on the spot. Some of the injured included Naeem Hussain, Akhtar Ali, Nijat Ali, Liaqat Ali, Akhlaq Hussain, Awal Hussain and Nusrat Hussain. The injured were rushed to District Headquarters Hospital in Kohat.

Labourer Umar Ijaz Ahmad, 40, died of sunstroke while working on a construction building in College Town on Kohat-Rawalpindi Road

Two people killed in kohat

Source Dawn

Two people, including a proclaimed offender, were gunned down in Bazid and Lal Garhi areas on Friday.
Unknown armed men killed the proclaimed offender, Ameer Zaman, in Baszid Khel and fled the scene. The son of the deceased, Ajmal, told the Riaz Khan Shaheed police his father was killed by unidentified people. In Lal Garhi, Mohammad Siddique was shot dead by two men, the police said. The police arrested the accused nominated in the FIR.

Gas supply to KDA phase 2

Source Dawn

The work on Rs54 million project to supply gas to the phase-II of the KDA town has been started besides repair work on the water supply machinery.
The project director of the posh KDA town, informed journalists the longstanding demand of the residents of phase-II for gas supply had materialised whereas pipelines were also being laid in phase-IX.
Similarly, the water pumping machinery which was rusting for years was being repaired. It would cost Rs2.15 million and the problem of shortage of water in the area would be resolved to some extent. He said MNA Khursheed Begum had allocated Rs5 million for purchase of new fire brigade vehicle. The streetlights on the roads leading to various mosques were also being repaired, he added.

Five die as truck runs over shoppers

Source Dawn

At least five people were killed and several others injured when a 10-wheeler truck ran over them in the main bazaar of Lachi town of Kohat on Friday. The truck also crushed three vehicles.

The truck (TKM-1198) was going to Kohat when the driver lost control over it, first hitting an electricity pole and then running over people who were busy shopping in the bazaar. Five shoppers were killed and several others injured. The giant truck also hit three vehicles, destroying them completely.The accident caused the worst kind of traffic jam on the Indus Highway. A large number of cars, trucks and passenger vehicles were stranded on the road in sweltering heat.
The Lachi police arrested the truck driver, Bakhtawar, resident of Bannu, and impounded the truck.

13 arrested for parallel policing

Source Dawn

Police on Saturday arrested 13 leaders of armed movement of Muhammadzai and sealed its office for running parallel policing system in the area.

After holding a meeting with some Muhammadzai elders here, District Police Officer Mubarek Zeb said that the movement had been banned and its office sealed for challenging the government`s writ. However, he allowed renaming of the movement as Islahi Committee, whose members would not carry arms and only confine to social activities. It would comprise 15 members.
The armed Ghazi Rajab Khan movement had been patrolling the borders with Orakzai Agency and the street of the area along with police for last many years to curb crime. A week ago, the armed members of the movement had beaten up four policemen, who asked them to surrender arms and stop patrolling the area.
The movement was formed for fighting wars with the Bezote tribesmen after they occupied Muhammadzai people`s mountain and land. The DPO also demanded surrender of the remaining men involved in beating of the policemen. On the request of elders, the movement was allowed to start social work and leave the land dispute to the government.

Boom returns to illicit arms trade in Darra

Source dawn

With normalcy slowly returning to Darra Adamkhel, the illicit arms trade at the old bazaar is picking up with every passing day.

Sitting in his shop in the bazaar a trader, Asmatullah, told this correspondent that business in the arms market was returning to `normal` after it mostly remained suspended since 2007 in the wake of military operation against the militants.
“Every shot fired in the air in the local bazaar means that a weapon has been sold after proper check,” said Asmatullah. These days the passengers crossing Darra Adamkhel on Kohat-Peshawar road often hear gunshots after every few seconds, which is a proof that gun manufacturing and selling has been picking up and people are less afraid of militants now.
Used to hearing sounds of heavy artillery firing at the hideouts of militants and blowing up of government buildings such as schools the tribesmen now say that influential harbourers of militants have left the area and their presence in bazaar is almost negligible.
Earlier, armed masked militants would patrol the bazaar and even kill local people on suspicion.
Few years ago, the local craftsmen would prohibit people from taking snapshots and making movies of their arms shops and factories because the TTP had declared weapons business haram (un-Islamic). But now the arms traders are cheerful and welcome the visitors for window shopping as usual.
A bearded shopkeeper in the arms bazaar said that the Darra tribesmen faced the bad days being stuck between the army and militants because they would patronise all sorts of crimes such as gambling, kidnapping for ransom, highway robberies and providing shelter to criminals from settled areas of the country.
During the past few years, the government forcefully checked all the illegal practices, but gave a sort of freedom to arms manufacturing. The government also employed local craftsmen at Pakistan Ordnance Factories, Wah, which they could not continue due to low salary.
An ordinary arms manufacturer can make a pistol in two days and earn at least Rs1,000. However, experienced people making automatic guns such a replica of Kalashnikov earn from Rs3,000 to Rs4,000 per weapon.
The establishment of arms showroom near the bazaar by the authorities to attract foreign visitors and buyers was liked by the local tribesmen, but growing acts of militancy jeopardised the project.
However, some companies are exporting shotguns under the watch of authorities in an attempt to curb smuggling and provide alternative legal business to the Darra arms manufacturers. Majority of the operators of arms and ammunition factories and artisans belongs to Punjab whose number is now growing, as they have started coming back after a marked improvement in the security situation in the area.

Durrani Prince Tomb in Kohat

 Source Wikipedia

image taken near kohat toi and shahpur area

Kohat tunnel reopens tomorrow

Source Dawn

The two kilometers long Friendship Tunnel on the Indus Highway will be opened for all kind of traffic after completion of necessary repair work on Wednesday morning.


The tunnel had been closed for traffic on May 2 for repair of tiles and electricity network which were damaged in a suicide blast. Traffic was diverted to alternative 11 kilometer long hilly track. The operation manager of the tunnel confirmed that the repair work had been completed in the scheduled time.