For this purpose secretary health was asked to prepare lists of the injured persons admitted in various health centres and provide it to the concerned district administrations and provincial relief commissioner as well so that injured could be paid Rs 25,000 each on the spot.
It was decided at a high level meeting at Civil Secretariat Peshawar on Tuesday chaired by the NWFP Senior Minister Sirajul Haq to further streamline relief activities in the worst affected districts as well as assess damages caused to public and private buildings, review reconstruction works and arrange amounts wherein necessary.
The meeting besides, Additional Chief Secretary Mir Laiq Shah was attended by administrative secretaries and other high ups of finance, education, health, works, public health, engineering, revenue and all other departments who highlighted relief activities, damaged assessments and required funds for their concerned departments.
Sirajul Haq was of the view that though the horrendous earthquake worst of our national history had also affected our government machinery but still performance of the concerned departments to cope with this catastrophe was not up to the mark and hence it was dire need to further streamline it. He expressed his concern that despite lapse of over 2 weeks, compensation amounts could not be paid to the victims though it were timely released to the concerned district administrations.
The senior minister under a unanimous decision has directed for payment of compensation amounts to the injured all over the province within a week time to be commenced from Wednesday at main hospitals of Peshawar. He also asked for simplifying the procedure for payment to the heirs of the deceased victims as well as owners of the destroyed properties to enable them start economic activities in the affected areas.
Provincial relief commissioner told the senior minister on this occasion that second and last tranche of the Rs 2,500 million announced by the federal government have been just received while Rs 50 million each from Sindh and Punjab governments were also released to the provincial government and all these funds have been allocated for the victims of the earthquake.
On this occasion the concerned secretaries apprised the participants of the damages caused to the buildings and properties of various government departments. Secretary Health Abdul Samad Khan told the meeting that damages to overall 275 health centres inflicted whereas 63 centres completely destroyed including DHQ hospitals of Batagram and Mansehra while 165 were partially damaged. Health department required Rs 5,530 million for its rehabilitation and reconstruction work.
The education department authorities told that 6,704 school buildings were completely or partially destroyed and the damages were estimated to about Rs 6,530 million. However, the schools and literacy department required 7,000 tents on emergency grounds to open schools in the affected areas soon after Eid-ul-Fitr. Similarly damages estimate of the colleges and higher education buildings was Rs 6,850 million while the department demanded 125 tents for starting college education in the worst affected areas.
It was decided on this occasion that students of the worst quake hit areas who are interested to seek admissions in colleges of other cities and provinces would be provided all expenditures from provincial government in order to save their precious academic year. The damaged estimates of police department were Rs 1,100 million and that of Frontier Constabulary Rs 10 million.
ACS told the meeting that Unicef has taken the responsibilities of rehabilitation and reconstruction of all the affected schools that was a good omen. However the senior minister directed the revenue department to play dynamic role for assessment of damages caused to private properties and also issue necessary directives to the provincial relief commissioner in this respect.