Squatters bring out land ownership papers

KARACHI:

New Karachi town razed houses on a strip of land next to Bismillah Colony only to discover that the house owners claim that they have the proper paperwork.

The houses were built on 110 feet of a 300-foot-wide road in the industrial area. “The people showed challans issued by the Sindh Katchi Abadi Authority (SKAA) and they are trying to rebuild the houses,” said a New Karachi town officer.

For their part, SKAA director Rustam Lashari said that challans were issued but only for the ownership of 120-square-yard plots in Bismillah Colony — a slum right across the road in question.

The 300-foot road is part of the New Karachi master plan, which cannot be altered, he told The Express Tribune.

To complicate matters, the Karachi Building Control Authority didn’t give permission to build. “The role of the KBCA starts after a layout plan has been received,” said New Karachi’s town building control officer Zafar Ahsan, adding that they didn’t receive any layouts for the construction of the houses on that road. “Any construction on that land would be illegal.”

According to a town officer, who did not want to be named, ‘influential’ people wanted to grab the land and had “forced” SKAA to issue the challans. However, after the demolition, SKAA disowned the challans.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 15^th, 2011.