AJK elections: PM Imran says Kashmiris to get health cards by year end

Addressing a public meeting in connection with the upcoming AJK elections, he said "Kalima Tayyaba is the actual bond between Pakistanis and Kashmiris".

"Pakistan and Kashmir's relationship is based on Islamic principles, nations are always built on ideologies which helps them understand a cause greater than individual goals." 

Envisioning Pakistan as state of Madina, the PM said Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) was the first person to establish an Islamic welfare state, and that the PTI-led government was trying to follow Prophet's teachings.

He said Khyber Pakhtunkhwa had given all of its citizens the health card, Punjab would give health cards to all citizens by the end of this year.

The premier said the countries with rule of law for all its citizens, rich and poor, alike had achieved progress and were prosperous whereas nations with two different sets of rules had doomed.

No nation on earth could aspire to rise unless there was uniform set of laws for all the people, he added.

“Those nations were destroyed who had no regard for rule of law or who had different rules for the rich and the poor,” he said, regretting that in Pakistan, the justice system could not nab the big fish.

Amid clapping and slogans by the huge gathering, the prime minister referred to creation of State of Madina by the Holy Prophet (Peace Be Upon Him), in which no one was regarded as above the law.

In an apparent reference to Nawaz Sharif and Asif Zardari, the prime minister said that those leaders could not fight the case of the country who had their properties, wealth and business abroad.

He said he would live and die for Pakistan as he had no stakes outside the country, otherwise he would have never replied to US “absolutely not”.

On the other hand, the other rulers would have allowed drone attacks inside the country, he added.

The prime minister linking his party’s struggle for the future of the country, young generations and rule of law, declared that the people in Kashmir ‘would never accept, liars, cowardice and corrupt as their leaders’.

For the first time in the country’s history, the prime minister said, they facilitating provisions of loans by the banks, so that the poor people and low-income groups could afford their own houses through easy installments.

The prime minister also informed that by the end of the year, they would be launching a new programme, ‘Kamyab Pakistan’, under which the poor families would get interest free loans for starting their small business.

Each member in a family would get such facility besides, technical education would be imparted to them especially to womenfolk who could earn their livelihood while sitting at homes due to use of latest technology.

The prime minister said his government was emulating the model of Riasat-e-Madina in which the poor people were lifted, a model also followed by China.

The prime minister while enumerating the steps taken for the welfare state, referred to setting up of Panah Gah, where the lodging and dining facilities were provided free to the labourers and daily wage earners, so that they could save their daily income and send them back to their families.

The prime minister saluted the brave struggle of the Kashmiri people against unabated Indian brutalities and oppression in the Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK).

He said that people in IIOJK were facing inhuman cruelties while offering unprecedented sacrifices for their legitimate rights like that of Burhan Wani. “The whole world is witnessing your great sacrifices and spirit and praying for you,” he maintained.

The prime minister said Indian prime minister Narendra Modi through illegal and unilateral steps of August 5, had never thought, that spirit of Kashimiri people could be bogged down.

The RSS-BJP ideology, he said, posed a real threat to India itself. The ruling junta did not recognize all the minorities living in India as their citizens.

The prime minister assured that he would continue raising his voice for their rights at all the global fora.

He said Pakistan and Kashmir were tied with each other upon that ideology which had been a basis for the creation of Pakistan.

Regarding PM Imran's recent interview wherein he remarked in outright negative when asked if Pakistan would allow US bases in Pakistan, he explained that he would not be in a position to make the “absolutely not” comment to the United States, had his properties and assets been out of Pakistan.

Without mentioining any names, the premier referred to a party leader whose all assets were based abroad so he couldn’t take a stand for the people he was representing, PM Imran said  “I can do this because I belong to Pakistan."

He again accused PML-N's Nawaz Sharif of faking his medical certificates and putting the system at stake and fleeing the country despite being convicted by the Supreme Court of Pakistan.