Indigenous locals express reservations over opening valley for tourists

Chitral: : At  Madak Lasht in Shishi Koh valley of Lower Chitral, the venue of the currently held winter snow sports festival, the Deputy Commissioner Lower Chitral, Hasan Abid, held a Khuli Katchehri  (open public forum) to listen to the views and problems of the people of the area. Residents of the area came up with different problems being faced by them particularly the absence of a decent road, and other basic facilities.

Open forum in Madaklasht valley

However the most unexpected demand put up by the residents was their opposition to setting up a tourist center in the area and open it up for tourism.

The residents seemed visibly perturbed by the sudden onslaught of tourists in the past couple of years even in winters and thought their culture, which they said is 400 years old when they settled in the valley after migrating from Afghanistan, would be adversely affected by the ‘invasion’, as they thought so

The deputy commissioner assured the participants of the forum that he would convey their feelings to the high ups about their reservations and other problems.… GH Farooqi, Chitral 01 Feb 2021

One thought on “Indigenous locals express reservations over opening valley for tourists

  1. The idea by Tourism Authority KPK for introducing a Chair lift link from Dir to Madak Lasht is against ground realities. whoever bethought it was in a state of Utopia. This will give Chitral no benefit but all the trillion Fund is meant for Swat and Dir. A few huts at Madak Lasht will bring no prosperity to the hamlet of Madaklasht but it is an impracticable rather impossible idea. Let the amount be utilized for the widening of road system in the valleys of Chitral and Dir. Give Chitral good road infrastructure to access to the summits of high Hindu Kush and make arrangements on the roadsides for facilitation that will make tour enjoyable to promote all kind of tourism- adventure tourism, cultural tourism, research tourism, religious tourism, geo tourism etc. in this mountainous country. Chair lift idea is not a feasible approach to promote tourism.

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