KOHAT: Farmers in Kohat have started harvesting the bumper guava crop, which is a local delicacy, with the fruit arriving in markets across Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and other cities.

Kaghzai, a village on the Hangu highway, has more than 450 guava orchards, whose owners have started the harvest.

The Kaghazai fruit, famous for its appetising sugary taste, is selling like hot cakes and being exported to Peshawar, Hangu, Kurram and Orakzai districts.

Shahid Nazeer, an official at the agriculture department’s statistics section, said guava orchards spread over 3,500 acres in Kohat, but Kaghazai had a prominent place. He said orchard owners in other areas were selling the land for construction of housing societies, but not a single Kaghazai orchard had been sold because it still fetched millions of rupees for the owners.

A contractor, namely Pehalwan, who hired two orchards with 800 trees, told Dawn that he had paid Rs1 million to the owner. “I supplied the fruit to the local wholesale markets and retail shops. I have fixed the rate at Rs180 per kilogramme locally, and from Rs200 to Rs250 per kg in Peshawar and Rawalpindi markets.”

Mohammad Bilal, who owns an orchard, said that Kaghazai variety was unmatched all over the country. He said the fruit could be identified from afar due to its sparkling and pinkish colour.

SHOP LOOTED: Unidentified robbers took away cash from an easy-paisa shop in Garden Colony, also injuring the owner with a dagger on Monday.

SHO Kohat city police station Amjid Khan told Dawn that the incident occurred in the afternoon when robbers barged into the shop and took away Rs100,000 cash. They also injured the owner, who has been shifted to hospital.

The police have registered FIR of the case on the complaint of the shop owner.

Published in Dawn, September 20th, 2022