MARDAN
\nKhyber Pakhtunkhwa Minister for Information and Public Relations Shafi Jan on Monday announced a special grant of Rs5 million for the Mardan Press Club and unveiled a series of welfare measures for journalists while addressing the oath-taking ceremony of the club\u2019s newly elected cabinet.
\nProvincial Minister for Revenue and Estate Tariq Mahmood Aryani was also present at the ceremony.
\nMr Jan administered the oath to the newly elected office-bearers and congratulated President Lutfullah Lutf, General Secretary Hidayat-ur-Rehman and other cabinet members. He expressed the hope that the new leadership would work for the welfare of the journalist community and uphold professional journalistic values.
\nAddressing the gathering, the information minister said the provincial government would provide a Rs5m grant for the press club. He added that the government would also undertake the rehabilitation of the press club building and consider including Mardan in the second phase of the Media Society project.
\nHe said the provincial government was addressing the issues of journalists and press clubs on a priority basis. According to him, the journalists\u2019 endowment fund has been increased to Rs500m in the provincial budget, while an interest-free loan scheme of up to Rs5m for journalists is being introduced. He also announced an internship programme for journalists\u2019 children with budgetary allocations.
\nMr Jan paid tribute to journalists for their professionalism and courage, particularly during the fight against terrorism.
\nTouching on political matters, he said the people of KP had given a mandate to Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) in the Feb 8 general elections and had defended that mandate. He claimed that Mardan had strongly supported the PTI and its founding chairman, Imran Khan.
\nHe said the provincial government had allocated the highest share of funds to the health and education sectors and was prepared to compete with any province in terms of governance and performance.
\nThe minister also alleged that the federal government owed KP trillions of rupees in pending dues and said the province would release funds to the federation only on the directives of PTI founder Imran Khan.
\nCriticising the governments in Punjab and Sindh, Mr Jan claimed that KP\u2019s governance was exemplary. He alleged financial irregularities in Punjab\u2019s \u201cSuthra Punjab\u201d project and said the people of Sindh continued to face shortages of clean drinking water and other basic services.
\nHe further alleged that Imran Khan and Bushra Bibi were being kept in solitary confinement without adequate medical facilities, calling it a violation of jail rules and the law.
\nSpeaking on the occasion, Revenue Minister Tariq Mahmood Aryani thanked Mr Jan for visiting Mardan and assured the press club of his full cooperation.
\nDuring the ceremony, Mr Jan presented a commemorative shield to former Information Department officer Shams-ul-Haq in recognition of his services to journalism and the department. The office-bearers of the Mardan Press Club also presented shields to the two provincial ministers.
\nThe ceremony was attended by journalists, political and social figures, and members of the press club.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
MARDAN Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Minister for Information and Public Relations Shafi Jan on Monday announced a special grant of Rs5 million for the Mardan Press Club and unveiled a series of welfare measures for journalists while addressing the oath-taking ceremony of the club\u2019s newly elected cabinet. Provincial Minister for Revenue and Estate Tariq Mahmood Aryani was …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":99471,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-99464","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-national"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99464","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=99464"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99464\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":99486,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99464\/revisions\/99486"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/99471"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=99464"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=99464"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=99464"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}