PR reclaims over 1,000 acres from squatters

Anti-encroachment operation under way in line with SC order

ISLAMABAD:

The Pakistan Railways (PR) has reclaimed around 1,007 acres of its land—worth millions of rupees—from illegal occupants during anti-encroachment operations being carried out across the country

“Around 491 acres [of land has been] retrieved in Punjab, 145 acres in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P), 339 acres in Sindh and 32 acres in Balochistan,” an official in the Ministry of Railways told APP on Sunday.

According to the official, squatters currently occupy about 3,287 acres of the railways’ land in Punjab, 832 acres in the K-P, 5,180 acres in Sindh, and 687 acres of land in Balochistan.

The operations for removing encroachments from railway land were initiated in light of the directives of the Supreme Court, he said.

A joint procedure order was issued to all divisional superintendents for retrieval of railways land. The anti-encroachment schedules are being prepared on a three-month basis and sent to all concerned in line with the joint procedure order, the official added.

He said the PR had decided to accelerate the ongoing anti-encroachment operations against land grabbers across the country, adding that the land grabbers included individuals, groups and even business organisations, which used it for residential, commercial, and agriculture purposes for decades.

“The encroachment operations have been launched with the assistance of the Railways police and district administrations of the relevant provincial governments,” he added.

He said the organisation was taking several steps to retrieve encroached land from the land grabbers. A detailed survey was being carried out to identify the encroached land, occupied by the individuals and under illegal occupation of various government departments.

The official said during the operation, first information reports (FIRs) were being lodged and cases being registered and sent to judicial magistrates for expeditious trial.

He said the issue of illegal occupation and possession of the PR land by government departments and institutions had also been taken up with the concerned departments.

“The PR owns 167,690 acres of land across the country, with 90,326 acres of land in Punjab, 39,428 acres in Sindh, 28,228 acres in Balochistan, and 9,708 acres in the K-P,” he said.

APP