LDA to construct new road for city project

LAHORE: Punjab Minister for Housing Mian Mehmoodur Rasheed announced that a new road link will be constructed to connect LDA City Housing Scheme (Phase-1) to Ferozepur Road.

Presiding over a progress review meeting of the scheme here on Wednesday, Rasheed said the government will construct a new 2-kilometre long road to provide another access route to the LDA City project. The scheme will be a new city of the future with all modern amenities.

He highlighted that the LDA City project is rapidly moving towards its completion owing to continued efforts of the authority’s Vice Chairman M S Ikram, LDA DG Muhammad Usman Mouzam and development partners for the project. Though the authority has already acquired a major chunk of land for the project, local landowners can still contact the city developer to sell their land for the scheme.

Meeting participants were told that development works are underway over an area of 4,000 kanals of LDA City. The authority will recover half of the development charges from file holders for which a procedure has already been finalised. Balloting for allotment of plot to file holders will be held on November 30 for which a working paper has been compiled and will be shared in the next meeting of the LDA’s Governing Body for formal approval.

It was also highlighted in the meeting, which was attended by LDA officials and development partners for the project, that it has been decided to prequalify contractors for performing different development works. For this purpose, the intending firms have been asked to submit their bids by October 25.

For rapid completion of the housing scheme, last week, Lahore Deputy Commissioner had issued Section 4 notification for compulsory land acquisition to connect LDA City Housing Scheme with main arteries of the provincial capital.

The authority had requested the deputy commissioner to impose Section 4 for compulsory land acquisition to connect the housing society with Gajjumatta, Kacha and Lahore Ring Road. Following the issuance of gazette notification of Section 4, now the authority will be able to acquire around 450 kanals of land for construction of main connecting roads.

The authority has already acquired over 90 per cent of the requisite land for the LDA City Housing Scheme (Phase-1). Earlier this year, the Supreme Court of Pakistan (SCP) had ordered the constitution of a committee to ensure the provision of land or payment of compensation to the file-holders of the LDA City. The court had issued this directive during a suo-motu hearing held at the Lahore registry.

The former chief justice of Pakistan Mian Saqib Nisar warned that if the LDA City case did not concern widows and orphans, then all bureaucrats involved in the housing project and owners of development companies would have been in jail.

The counsel representing the LDA City project, Advocate Ahsan Bhawan, told the court that development companies would provide land for the mega housing project within two to three years. He recommended that this time should be reduced for provision of land on which the former top judge directed if these companies required to provide land do not do so within a year, then the contract with them should be cancelled.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 17^th, 2019.