MANSEHRA: Tehsil nazim Khurram Khan Swati has reinstated 20 Tehsil Municipal Administration employees after successful talks with their association.

Former tehsil municipal officer Arif Baloch had terminated the services of 20 TMA employees three months ago insisting they were appointed earlier this year in violation of the rules.

L abour union president Tanveer Ahmad told reporters here on Monday that a series of talks between the union leaders andtehsil nazim led to the restoration of the employees.

He said the nazim reinstated employees after learning that their sacking was against the rules.

Mr Tanveer said reinstatement was an Eid gift for the sacked employees and their f amilies.

He said his union was working to provide better civic services to people in tehsil and those employees restored would strictly follow instruction of TMA officers to make city and its suburbs pollution and garbage free.

The union president said all TMA employees, especially sanitation workers, would continue doing their respective duties diligently, to keep the city and its suburbs clean and pollution-free.

NO SALARY: The workers of over 300 nurseries established in the private sector to provide saplings for the Billion Tree TsunamiAfforestation Project have complained about the non-payment of salary for months.

`Eidul Fitr is around the corner but we haven`t been paid salary for the last six months distressing us and our family members, labourer Hazrat Khan told reporters here on Monday.

Accompanied by other nursery workers, Mr Hazrat Khan said the government had collected samplings from their nurseries established for the af forestation project but hadn`t paid their workers salary for six months.

He also complained that the government had set up 300 nurseries to collect saplings for the Inhar watershed division but had withheld funds allocated for them.

`We have learned that the Inhar watershed division has sufficient money in its bank accounts, but wonder why the nursery owners aren`t being paid,` labourerMohammad Naeem said.

The labourer urged the chief minister to step in and ensure the immediate payment of dues to him and other nursery workers to ease the misery of the families.

FOOD DISTRIBUTED: The Al-Khidmat Foundation on Monday distributed food packets to 300 deserving families in Mansehra district.

The packets were given away to orphans and windows during a ceremony held here.

District information secretary of the foundation Kamran Riaz told reporters here that his organisation recently launched free ambulance service in Mansehra, Balakot and Oghi and would soon extend it to other parts of the district.

He said the Agosh orphanage run by the Al-Khidmat Foundation offered food and shelter to 100 orphans from the district.