People, industry can’t sustain more pressure: PM

GHALLANAI: Blaming the previous governments for the circular debt, Prime Minister Imran Khan said Monday that the government would not raise the electricity and gas tariffs.

He said that the people and industries could not sustain more pressure. He said that if he had not been a sportsman, he would have conceded defeat. He said if the whole family had not been the plunderer, it would have not been in London.

The prime minister was addressing a gathering at the Captain Roohullah Shaheed Sports Stadium at Ghallanai to inaugurate the Ehsaas Kafalat Programme in the tribal district. Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Governor Shah Farman, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Mahmood Khan, Federal Ministers Pervez Khattak, Murad Saeed and Noorul Haq Qadri were also present. The prime minister distributed the cheques under the Ehsaas Kafalat Programme among the deserving families. In his speech, Imran Khan said that the Ehsaas Kafalat Programme would help reduce poverty in the tribal districts. Hesaid that under the initiative, the poor families would receive Rs2,000 monthly financial assistance. The prime minister said that the government would also extend loans to the jobless youth. He said that every year the government would award 50,000 scholarships to the deserving students. Imran Khan said that the government was taking steps to eradicate poverty by distributing cows, buffaloes, chickens among the people to help fight poverty. Coming down hard on the opposition leaders, he saidthat the former ‘corrupt rulers’ were fleeing the country. He added that Pakistan did not come into being to be ruled by the corrupt. Turning to India, the prime minister said the fascist government of Narendra Modi was perpetrating atrocities against Kashmiris and other Muslims in India. “Modi wants to impose the ideology of the RSS on the Muslims, Sikhs, Christians and Dalits. This ideology [of RSS] is based on narrowmindedness and oppression,” he remarked.

On Afghanistan, he added that the merged districts would benefit from the restoration of peace to the neighbouring country. Speaking on the occasion, Chief Minister Mahmood Khan announced special packages for road infrastructure, solar tube-wells and water supply schemes for Mohmand district. He said that tribal districts were replete with precious mineral resources and the provincial government was working to utilize these for the development of the merged areas. Earlier, Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Social Protection and Poverty Alleviation Sania Nishtar, who is also heading the Ehsaas programme, shed light on the salient features of the initiative.

Meanwhile, nine workers of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) sustained injuries when a railing collapsed at the stadium when the prime minister was entering the venue for the gathering.