Widow in court battle to evict police from house

Race Course police has set up a precinct within the rented premises

RAWALPINDI: A widow has been running from pillar-to-post to have her house, rented by the Race Course Police, vacated.

As a legal battle for possession of the property continues, its owner claims the building has suffered extensive damaged since no repairs had been carried out.



Zamurd Begum, the owner of the eight marla house located in Dhoke Misrial within the limits of RA Bazaar, has filed two cases against the district police. One of those cases has been pending before a civil judge of Rawalpindi while a second case was filed with the Rawalpindi Cantonment Board Rent Controller.

A widow, she had filed the eviction petitions after several applications submitted to the Rawalpindi police SSP Operations, the City Police Officer and the inspector general of Punjab police from 2007 failed to wrest control of the property.

The eviction petitions, seen by The Express Tribune, stated that the house had been bought in 1974. Later in 2000, her husband had rented out the premises to the RA Bazaar police to set up a police post.

Known as the Race Course Police Post, it was upgraded and granted the status of an independent police station in 2012.

The Race Course Police Station started operating in the same building since there was no other building for the station. Zamrud’s son, Chaudhry Zeeshan, told The Express Tribune that last month they had secured a clear cut eviction order from a civil judge and a court bailiff had been appointed to evict police from the house.

He showed documents which revealed that police personnel at the station had misbehaved with the bailiff and had refused to vacate the house.

Zeeshan detailed that the house has four bedrooms, a kitchen and a washroom. Police, however, had set up a prison in the kitchen after altering the room, he said.



Zeeshan claimed that their property had been extensively damaged since no repairs or maintenance work had been affected for a long time. He added that his family had also filed for damages against the police.

Asked whether police was paying the rent for the building, Zeeshan said that the police paid them Rs3,300 every month. However, he contended that the rent was too meagre when compared to current market evaluations of the house and neighbourhood.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 11^th, 2017.