PESHAWAR: Seven contractors have been arrested over embezzlement and an amount of Rs55 million has been recovered from them.
According to an official handout, the contractors were arrested in tribal and semi-autonomous Frontier Regions (FRs) for taking advance payments of Rs130 million for development projects which they either never launched or left halfway. The arrests were made as a result of a crackdown launched on the directives of Governor Sardar Mahtab Ahmad Khan against such contractors and the government officials who were hand in glove with them.
The governor issued directives to identify all such type of schemes and expose the contractors/government officers involved in embezzlement.
He also directed strict action against them and to recover the amount so far taken by the contractors as advance payments. Every penny of development grants belongs to the tribesmen and transparent use of public exchequer will be ensured at all cost, the governor said.
All those involved in misappropriating the funds will be dealt with iron hands irrespective of their status, the governor added. Tribal people and the contractors who are earning money by legal means should extend their full coordination to government officials in a bid to expose the illegal ones, the governor urged.
