TIMERGARA, July 22: The parents of girl students here on Sunday demanded of the government to appoint principal and lecturers at the lone degree college for girls in Timergara before August 1.

They told Dawn that the post of principal at the college had been lying vacant for the last four years. They said that posts of lecturers in various disciplines including English, Urdu, chemistry, statistics, Islamiat and Pashto had also been vacant since long.

“We want our daughters to get higher education in our own area but successive governments didn’t provide educational facilities to poor people,” said Muhabat Shah. He added that hundreds of students were affected by shortage of teaching staff at the local girls college.

Mr Shah said sometimes male teachers from Postgraduate College Timergara had been called to teach to girls owing to which parents were reluctant to send their daughters to the college.

The residents of the area said that there were only 180 seats for students of first year. Hundreds of girl students gave up education when they failed to get admission in the local college. “There is only one degree college for girls in Dir Lower while population of the district has crossed the figure of 900,000,” local elders said. They demanded of provincial minister for education, provincial minister for technical education and director colleges to increase seats for students and fill the vacant posts at the college.

PROTEST: The residents of Chat Pat village on Sunday held a protest rally against Wapda authorities for their failure to repair the power transformer, which had been out of order for the last one week.

Local elders Haji Salim Khan, Nasir Khan and Mohammad Israr addressed the protesters and said that the residents of the area were living without electricity for the last one week. They said that local lawmakers were taking no interest in resolving problems of people. The protesters chanted slogans against the local lawmakers and demanded of the government to immediately repair the power transformer otherwise they would have no option but to come on the roads.

Meanwhile, people also complained that power supply remains suspended during sehri and iftar times in Talash and other areas.

Also, the residents of Adenzai, Talash and Timergara complained on Sunday that traders had increased prices of daily use items by 300 per cent in Ramazan.

They demanded of the officials concerned to pay frequent visits to different bazaars during Ramazan to control the prices.