Traders withdraw shutter-down strike call
Traders on Sunday announced to withdraw their scheduled shutter-down strike call in Rawalpindi Cantonment areas against the sealing of old grant residential properties after Rawalpindi Cantonment Board (RCB) authorities assured them of no further action.
The RCB had sealed over 500 old grant residential properties over their commercial use without declaring their commercial lease status.
The RCB administration de-sealed the properties and assured them not to seal them in the future and directed property owners to approach the RCB for the regular commercial lease of their residential properties.
The RCB had sealed around 500 such old grant properties, whose status was residential but they were being used for commercial purposes without having a regular commercial lease.
In response to the crackdown by the RCB, traders had announced a complete shutter-down strike and a sit-in outside the RCB office on Monday.
But after contact between the RCB administration and traders, it was decided that the properties which have been sealed will be de-sealed and no property will be sealed in the future.
However, for all such old grant properties whose legal status was residential and which have been brought into commercial use in various markets, property owners of those properties will apply for a commercial regular lease and in this process, the maximum possible relief will be extended by the RCB to the property owners.
Published in The Express Tribune, March 6th, 2023.