Tribesmen demolished an allegedly unlawful toll plaza, erected at Pak-Afghan Highway, Katta Kushtha area of Jamrud, Khyber district on Saturday.
Thousands of anti-toll plaza afire tribal people from across the Khyber district had thronged to the site and bulldozed the toll plaza set up by the National Highway Authority (NHA) a few days back. Heavy machinery was utilised to demolish it.
It is pertinent to mention that 10 days earlier, a dispute erupted between local transporters and the contractor of the toll plaza when the latter started collecting Rs 250 per truck, passing through the toll plaza.
In reaction, the transporter along with locals blocked the Pak-Afghan Highway for heavy traffic.
The protestors were of the opinion that at the time of merging, the Federally Administered Tribal Areas had been declared exempt of all kind of tax for five years and therefore setting up toll plaza at Pak-Afghan Road was illegal.
On the other hand, the toll plaza’s operations manager Sarfraz said that they had got the contract of the toll plaza for a year legally and with the consent of authorities concerned, they were authorised to receive specific fee of Rs 250 from Afghan transit vehicles.
