CHITRAL: Union council Arandu is situated on Pak Afghan border areas where 25000 peoples living still in the stone age period. There is no communication, health, education, potable drinking water, or another facility in this backward and neglected area. Hundreds of people of Arandu held a public meeting for their rights, which was presided over by Abdul Majeed Nazim Village Council Arandu. This meeting was attended by all Leaders of political and religious parties without any political affiliation, whose one-point agenda was to do justice to the peoples of Arandu and also to develop them.
Arandu consists of five village councils. Peoples of seven tribes live here but residents of this neglected area are still forced to live like in the stone age period. This valley was sometimes bombed by the Russians Army during the Afghanistan war and sometimes by the American forces.
Speakers on the occasion said that Russian warship plans also bombed and shelling on this town in which many people were martyred and many houses were destroyed. The people of the valley have played the role of a front-line force and front to save Chitral.
The speakers said that the construction of Arandu road had started some years ago but it was left incomplete and still 32km of the road is earthen. The speakers said that there is only one river between Afghanistan and Pakistan and on both sides of the river. People of the same community tribe live in both countries.
In the past, the peoples of this country had relations across the border, and for centuries, the people of both countries have been living a life of brotherhood with each other, but recently we cannot meet each other.
The speakers said that patients from across the border used to come to this valley for treatment, but a Basic Health Unit has been upgraded in 2009, and given the status of RHC i.e. rural health center, there has been no doctor in this RHC for long. The speakers said that the doctor belongs to the lower districts and he comes back after two months after making all his attendances while in this RHC only one local medical technician Sher Ghani son of Mehrab Gul runs the entire hospital as well as examines the patients.
In this regard, our correspondent repeatedly called the District Health Officer Dr. Fayyaz Rumi and sent him a message asking him to give his version as to why the doctor comes after two months and goes back with all his attendance, but he has not yet responded, However, by calling his office, Deputy DHO Dr. Ziaullah Khan said that there is no truth in these allegations, there are two doctors who are on duty for fifteen days alternately, but the son of Dr. Fayyaz who was on duty yesterday fell ill and had to leave suddenly because of this, a doctor was not found present when hospital visited by elected Nazims.
The speakers said that the number of teachers in the high school of Arandu is very less, while the higher secondary school has been closed for a long time and there is neither a teacher nor a student in it. The building of this school is of no benefit to the students here. Now, 1st year and 2nd year students study in the high school building.
In this regard, when District Education Officer Mehmood Ghaznavi was contacted, he had gone to Peshawar for some official work, while Deputy Education Officer Shahid Hussain said that there are only 244 students in Arandu High School with fifteen teachers. About the Higher Secondary School, he said that only 34 students are studying in the Higher Secondary School as 9 vacancies are vacant in the Higher Secondary portion which can only be filled by the Secretary of Education.
The speakers said that there is neither mobile phone nor internet in the whole of Arandu and even in this modern era where students study online, they are deprived of basic needs and facilities like the internet. They said that there is a regular mobile phone tower in the Afghanistan area across Arandu and not only the people living here but also government employees use the cellular phone SIM of Afghanistan due to which millions of rupees of income go to Afghanistan. They said that people in other areas, especially students, are getting a lot of benefits from the internet because the world is a global village, but our students don’t even know what is happening in Chitral beyond Arandu.
How will we know about other parts of Pakistan? Speakers criticized the Department of Public Health Engineering and said that PHE had embezzled million of rupees and brought drinking water schemes but all of them failed. They mentioned a water tank which is probably the eighth wonder of the world. The tank was built for water, for which former provincial minister Saleem Khan Chitrali provided funds, but the water pipe has been passed through the tank and instead of collecting the water in the tank, it is distributed to the public through the pipe. A water tank has been made just for show and the water pipe passes straight out from the middle of the tank and this tank is empty.
In this regard, Arshad Iqbal, Executive Engineer of the Department of Public Health Engineering was contacted and asked, what was the need to spend such a large amount of money on this tank when water is not poured or collected in it and the pipeline is not connected to it. He said that he would inquire about it. On this occasion, the speakers also thanked the Pakistan Army, who had built a children’s park at Arandu and continues to cooperate with people in other works.
The speakers also criticized the forest department for not recruiting on a merit basis. Arandu is a forest area and it will be difficult to protect the forest unless the local people are not recruited by the forest department who deserve it. That a regular quota should be approved for this backward area in Levies, Forest, and other departments because the quality of education here is very weak and the candidates here cannot compete with the candidates from other areas in the field of education VC Nazim Abdul Majeed, Haji Ghulam Yusuf Inspector Retired, Mulla Udina Shah Retired Headmaster, Qari Ali Akbar, Maulana Samiul Haq, Gulzada, Hazrat Ali, Shireen Muhammad, etc. expressed their views during the public meeting.
The speakers also demanded from the provincial and federal government that Arandu was deliberately neglected in past and was treated like a stepmother, that education, health, communication, and other facilities should be provided here and that these people should not be forced to live in the stone age.
