MANSEHRA: Local government representatives on Monday warned to launch a street agitation if the Balakot hydropower project management did not induct locals into the project.

“The dam is being built in our tehsil and the district administration acquired more than 8,000 kanals of the land but locals are still being ignored in the employment opportunities,” Mohammad Shakeel Awan, a local councilor, told a gathering attended by the chairmen and councilors of all 48 village and neighborhood councils in the Balakot tehsil.

The LG representatives denounced the delay in the payments of the lands acquired for the 300-megawatt Balakot hydropower project and the appointment of

non-locals.

They also announced to block Mansehra-Naran-Jalkhad road to traffic for the indefinite period if the government didn’t accept their demands, which were already accepted by the district administration at the time of land acquisition for the dam.

Shakeel Awan said the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government had already acquired over 8,000 kanals land for the energy project.

“Our graveyards and agricultural fields are also going to be submerged in the dam’s reservoir but locals are still being ignored by the executing agency in appointments,”

he said.

Another councillor said that the 880-megawatt Suki Kinari hydropower project was also being executed upstream of the Balakot hydropower project in the River Kunhar, which couldn’t end the deprivations of the locals, nor bring prosperity in their lives.

Pakhtunkhwa Energy Development Organisation (Pedo) started the execution of the Balakot hydropower project in March this

year after the executive committee of the National Economic

Council (Ecnec) approved $750 million for it.