Ali Afzal Afzaal

Shuhada packages were distributed by the government to the families of teachers who were killed by armed men on May 4 in the Kurram district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

On this occasion, the district administration gave checks of Rs.55 lakh to the families of the teachers and Rs.10 lakh to the families of the deceased workers.

It should be noted that on the 4th of this month, 8 people, including teachers, were killed by gunmen in Government High School Tari Mangal near the Pak-Afghan border.

Federal Minister for Overseas Pakistanis Sajid Hussain Turi said that the teachers had no land dispute with anyone, adding that full legal action is being taken against their killers. While the elements involved in the incident should be given exemplary punishment, no harm should be done to any innocent person and efforts should be continued to establish peace and order, he furthered.

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On this occasion, Subedar (R) Mir Hussain, the father of Syed Hussain, the teacher who died in Tari Mangal School, said that my son was going to get married on May 12, but I was given a check on the day of the wedding for my son’s murder. “What should I do with this fifty-five lakh rupees? I wish My son would have got married today and 55 lakh rupees would have been spent on his wedding, but unfortunately, eight days before the wedding he was put to eternal sleep by terrorists.”

He added: “My son did his MPhil, and worked for only seven months. Terrorists killed innocent people; I had a lot of hopes for my son.”

Another old father, Habib Ali, on receiving a check of 55 lakhs for the murder of his MPhil teacher son Mehdi Hussain, said, “The light of my eyes is gone. Death and life are in the hands of Allah, but I must ask this much; In what crime was my son killed?”

Samar Abbas, the son of school teacher Liaqat Hussain who was killed in Tari Mangal School, said that his father spent fourteen years in Tari Mangal School and raised and trained school children like us. “On the day of the incident, our father was sick but still went to school and innocent people were killed there.”

Zaman Hussain was among the three laborers killed in Tari Mangal School. Zaman Hussain’s ten-year-old son Samar Abbas said that two of my father’s brothers had been martyred in earlier bomb blasts and we have been left helpless after my father’s murder.

Human Rights Organization (HRCP) Kurram District Coordinator Azmat Alizai, PPP Kurram General Secretary Haji Jameel Turi, Tehreek-e-Insaf Syed Jafar, Chairman Zalmay Syed Asghar said that on May 4, 2023, the murder was committed in Tari Mangal Government School of Kurram area. They also demanded to the government to announce thirty-three lakh rupees instead of Rs. 1 million to the families of the three laborers so that the orphans of these poor families can be used.

On the other hand, while addressing a joint press conference in the presence of Turi Bangash tribe leader Allama Tajmal Hussain and other elders in Parachinar, teacher leaders Master Bilal Hussain and Master Iqar Hussain, who are performing duties in the remote tribal areas, said that more than two hundred Turi male and female teachers of Bangash tribes are working in remote tribal areas; and for many years, they have been making efforts for transfer, but they are not being transferred, and they are being killed in the line of duty on various pretexts.

According to them, the killing of seven people, including four teachers, in Tari Mangal High School on May 4th is clear proof of this, where four teachers and three laborers of Turi Bangash tribes were killed only on the basis that a person from another tribe was killed on the same day.

The leaders of the teachers’ union have announced that they will refuse to work in remote tribal areas until the government guarantees their safety and ensures that teachers are posted to their duty stations according to the two-to-one formula. They added that the formula used for teacher recruitment should also be applied to their posting, in order to ensure fairness and transparency.