Operation against encroachments begins in DG Khan

LDA retrieved over 31 kanals of land from land grabbers and also demolished illegal structures

DERA GHAZI KHAN: Like other parts of the province, operation clean up against encroachments in Dera Ghazi Khan also started on Wednesday.

As part of the campaign, large signboards installed at shops and intersections have been removed, while shopkeepers, who did not remove encroachments despite orders, have been fined thousands of rupees.

The operation is being conducted by the municipal corporation staff and supervised by the magistrate. Though traders have protested the move, the citizens have expressed happiness over the initiative. Citizens have started removing shades and other encroachments by themselves.

District administration officials told The Express Tribune that on the directives of Punjab Chief Minister Usman Buzdar, the administration has conducted an operation against the encroachment mafia along with the municipal corporation staff.

The crackdown has been initiated at the Pull Daat, College Chowk, Hospital Chowk to Railway Road, Traffic Chowk and Multan Road. During this time, the staff demolished encroachments that had been taken out of the shop beyond the limits and moved the footpath ahead. They also removed the billboards.

Despite repeated notices and announcements by the district administration to remove the encroachments, shopkeepers who did not act accordingly were fined thousands of rupees.

In the operation that was conducted without discrimination in Khayaban Sarwar area, the green belts outside the buildings of the serving MNA Shahnaz Saleem Malik, and MPA Muhammad Hanif Khan Patafi were cleared of encroachments. However, the local residents criticised the administration for not removing the encroachments and barriers around the buildings of the Senator Dr Abdul Hafiz Karim.

The residents of the locality have demanded strict action against encroachers and demanded the authorities to recover the land of the General Bus Stand, Rickshaw stand and service station areas. They have demanded that the government land be cleared of the land mafia without any discrimination.

However, on some occasions, the operation met with resistance from the traders and citizens upon which a heavy contingent of the police was summoned to control the law and order situation. The move by the administration to utilise police in the operation and not taking the public and traders into confidence was severely criticised.

In view of the situation, a delegation of the officials of the Chamber of Commerce and Traders organisations met Deputy Commissioner Ali Akbar Bhatti and endorsed the operation against encroachments by the Punjab government.

The deputy commissioner assured the delegation of addressing the reservations of the traders' organisations. He urged them to put an end to the encroachments.

He said that a team of experts has been constituted in the district regarding encroachments in city markets which will point out encroachments and the traders will remove them.

Meanwhile, the Lahore Development Authority (LDA) continued its operation against land grabbers and retrieved over 31 kanals of land from them on Wednesday.

LDA officials conducted an operation in Sabzazar Housing Scheme to vacate precious state land from illegal occupants and retrieved 55 residential plots worth millions of rupees. The officials also razed illegal structure to the ground in block D of the scheme.

LDA Director General Amna Imran Khan has said that reclaiming state land from illegal occupants is a priority of the provincial government. By launching a crackdown against land grabbers writ of the government is being restored, she said.

Estimates suggest that over 31,000 kanals of state land are under illegal occupants in Lahore alone. Over 280 acres of the forest department's land, eight plots in the Walled City of Lahore Authority (WCLA), 636 kanals of LDA land and 32 plots of the Metropolitan Corporation Lahore (MCL) are under land-grabbers control.

According to an LDA spokesman, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government is committed to reclaiming all state land from land grabbers. So far the authority has conducted operations in Johar Town, PIA Road, Sabzazar, Multan Road, Bahira Town, Anarkali, Urdu Bazaar, Harbanspura, Daroghawala and several other areas of the provincial metropolis.