PM rejects allegation about making Azad Kashmir province

TARAR KHAL (AJK), Jul 23,2021- Prime Minister Imran Khan on Friday rejected the impression that the PTI wanted to make Azad Kashmir a province of Pakistan.

The PTI, he said, strongly believed in the United Nations Security Council resolutions under which the people of Jammu and Kashmir were given the right to choose whether they wanted to accede to Pakistan or India.

Addressing a huge public gathering here on the last day of election campaign for the AJK Legislative Assembly, he said both PML-N leader Nawaz Sharif and Pakistan Peoples Party chief Asif Ali Zardari, he said, had never pleaded the case of Kashmir internationally during their tenures in government.

Nawaz Sharif – Modi meeting in Nepal

He pointed out that Nawaz Sharif, according to Indian journalist Barkha Dutt, held secret meetings with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Nepal against the Pakistan Army. He (Nawaz Sharif) also invited Modi, who was involved in firing pellet gunshots at the Kashmiris, to his family marriage ceremonies, but did not bother to meet the Kashmiri Hurriyat leaders in India, he added.

Poverty alleviation in AJK is top agenda

Imran Khan said the PTI had on its agenda several development projects aimed at poverty alleviation in the state. He said the prime focus of PTI in the Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) would be the uplift of underprivileged people by ensuring education, health and subsidized food.

The prime minister vowed to launch special programmes for low-income class in the AJK after his party won the upcoming election. He said for the 40 percent of poor population, the ration cards for food items on subsidized rates would be introduced.

He said a software for the said facility would be launched by December, a database of which had already been prepared.

He mentioned that the poor in AJK would get basic food items, including flour, pulses, edible oil and sugar on cheaper rates.

Under the Kamyab Pakistan programme, he said, of the 40 percent low-income people, each member of the family would be given technical education and interest-free loans to help them earn their livelihood.

Imran Khan said the PTI government would also introduce a health card scheme for the people in AJK with Rs one million health insurance per household.

Rigging allegation in AJK elections

Imran Khan said some political parties had already crying foul about rigging in the upcoming AJK elections. Those making a hue and cry of false rigging assumptions were, in fact, afraid of their defeat in the elections, he added. How could the PTI carry out rigging with the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) government at the helm of affairs in the AJK, having its administration and the election commission of its choice, he questioned.