SWAT: Chief Minister Mahmood Khan on Friday termed the Sehat Sahulat Programme a flagship and pro-poor scheme of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government, saying the project was another major step towards realisation of Prime Minister Imran Khan’s vision of a welfare state.

He was addressing a public meeting here in the Grassy Ground where Prime Minister Imran Khan formally launched the extension of Sehat Sahulat Programme to Malakand division.

He said the project would prove to be a milestone in ensuring provision of free and quality healthcare facilities to the entire population of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

“The project is a complete package of social protection which, besides ensuring free treatment facilities to the masses, will help reduce poverty and improve living standard of the common man in the province,” he said.

Mahmood Khan said the programme would be expanded to the whole province by end of January next year in four different phases.

“In the first phase, the Sehat Sahulat Programme has been extended to Swat, Upper Chitral, Lower Chitral, Malakand, Upper Dir and Lower Dir, while in the second phase it will be extended to Shangla, Kohistan, Battagram, Mansehra, Torghar and Buner districts by next month. The project will cover the rest of districts by January next year,” he said.

The chief minister stated that through extension of the programme to the whole population of the province over six million households would get free healthcare facilities and each household would have the facility to get free treatment of up to Rs1 million annually.

“Each and every individual in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa holding a national identity card could get free medical treatment in the selected public and private hospitals,” he said.

Highlighting his government’s development strategy, he said that work on various mega development projects in the province was in progress whereas many such schemes would be launched in the coming days.

Federal minister Murad Saeed, provincial minister Shaukat Yousafzai and others also spoke on the occasion.

Meanwhile, the prime minister and chief minister formally inaugurated the newly-constructed block of Saidu Medical College. Earlier, the prime minister along with Governor Shah Farman and the chief minister visited the newly-developed tourist spot of Gabeen Jabba where they were briefed by the relevant officials about camping pods set up there by the provincial government.

Published in Dawn, November 7th, 2020