There is little to deny, with few exceptions, the durability of long-term plan and projects, for the development of physical infrastructure, done by government in the form of roads, power generation facility, bridges, and water channels in different places in Chitral.
This does not mean to subside the contributions of civil society organizations as they continue to do in different hard places in Chitral. Primarily it’s not the government itself rather few officials to be held responsible somewhere for compromise with the work and mishaps done. And there may be questions could be raised on the nature of the work done by local and national contractors as it becomes costly given the loose oversight by concerned responsible officials.
If one concedes with the above statement, then the key question is where the government lacks to act?
Indeed, the government departments do their mandated works with traditional procedural redtap in doing with the proposal to planning takes longer as its implementation on the ground. There are some works of rapid response and piloting emergency action, because of procedural limitations, where government lacks to act. To understand this, how it costs government exchequer and public tribulations, the road in Shadaer at Reshun is a test case.
Almost two years ago, when river yarkhun continued eroding the land it remained unaddressed. (This road, for second time, has become blocked for traffic as people coming from down districts to their homes for Eidul Azha celebrations). Concerned departments and administration would have taken notice of it but rapidly responding to it stifled in procedural limitations. The cost of the work, among others, has now skyrocketed as it happens in every such project, to control further land erosion in Reshun and restoration of road for traffic.
The government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has done with some optimum digitization in education, health and police department which has somehow eased traditional procedural processes. This has led to rapidly responding to some of the key matters require exigency.
Emergency situations and especially climate vulnerability demands government rapid response and preparedness against any unexpected situation arising from Glacial Lake Outburst Floods (GLOFs), land erosions, cutting off land communication, water supplies and electricity. Piloting digitized mapping of looming threats, resulting from natural and human-made disasters, and rapidly acting on them is the only way out in the age of technology. That can be done only when government creates a digitized dashboard responding to emergencies, by an application, with a fund in place could be disbursed without procedural red-tap. This is something could be done in those departments which are mandated to respond to construct and repair roads, water supplies, electricity, and bridges, otherwise it costs government exchequer hugely and left public hard-pressed in tribulations, and transportation of goods and services hampered.
