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‘Naya Pakistan Housing Scheme’ was made in ‘Purana Pakistan’, alleges journalist

News Desk

May 20

Prime Minister Imran Khan inaugurated a low-cost housing colony for labourers and industrial workers on Wednesday.

The PM said the housing scheme for workers in Peshawar was launched in 2011 but it remained incomplete since then as it was not a priority because it was meant for the poor labourers. He said he wanted to see how much the condition of the poor had improved after the five-year tenure of the PTI government. This new project has now been put under the ‘Naya Pakistan Housing Scheme’.

However, a report by journalist Izharullah sets the record straight about the origins of the scheme.





The labour colony in the Regi Lalma area of Peshawar was approved in 2008 during the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) regime. Work on the project began in 2011, with a total of 1,200 flats. However, in 2013, construction of 1,000 additional flats was approved.

The project was funded by the Workers’ Welfare Board, an organisation working for the welfare of workers, and funding for it was obtained from the Workers’ Welfare Fund set up under the same board.

Addressing the inaugural function, PM Imran Khan said that the government had launched a ‘new Pakistan housing scheme’ under which the working class and the poor would get houses.

At the time the colony was approved, there was a PPP-Awami National Party coalition government in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Work on the labour colony began in April 2011, and was completed in 2020. Some work is still pending though.

These flats were approved for labourers in Hattar, Peshawar, Takht Bai, and Haripur. These projects were later inaugurated in 2013 by the then PPP Provincial Labour Minister Sher Azam Wazir. The old name plates have been removed and the housing scheme has been inaugurated once again.

Special Assistant to Chief Minister Khyber Pakhtunkhawa, Kamran Bangash, tweeted that about half of the flats were started in 2011, while the rest were started in 2013. “However, due to the Workers Welfare Fund being a federal department, the funds of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were cut off during the Nawaz era,” tweeted Bangash.


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