PESHAWAR - Residents of Garhi Faizullah Urmar Miana on Wednesday opposed the establishment of a provincial government proposed new city between districts Peshawar and Nowshera and urged the incumbent rulers to stop destroying their cultivable lands.
"The government should select barren lands instead of razing orchards and lands producing net products like wheat, maize and fresh vegetables, Nasir Iqbal," a local said while addressing a news conference here at press club. He said that the former nationalist government recommend the establishment of a controversial Asfandyar city adjacent to their villages, which the concerned locals challenged in the court.
Flanked by other villagers Musharaf Shah, Noroaz, and Nasir Khan, he said that former provincial government had selected the stated place for the proposed city to serve their own interests instead of keeping in view the actual feasibility, as about 80 per cent of their cultivable lands would be come under the proposed city. But now, he regretted, the incumbent PTI-led provincial government once again planning to re-start the already disputed and suspended project.       
"The establishment of this new city was tantamount to snatch a source of earning livelihood from the inhabitants of the area," Iqbal said.  They warned the government to refrain from initiating such big projects on controversial locations and select alternate suitable place where the lives of locals and cultivable lands couldn't be affected.