SHC issues notice to officials over unpaid compensation

KARACHI: The Sindh High Court issued notice to the Advocate General Sindh, chief secretary, director of the Lyari Expressway Rehabilitation Project (LERP) and the City District Government Karachi (CDGK) for not paying compensation to 144 affectees.

Petitioner Muhammad Atif and 143 other persons submitted a petition, saying that the government had acquired their land in Gulshan-e-Mustafa, Sooba Nagar, Goharabad, Muslim Colony and Bhingoria Goth of Gulberg Town to construct the Lyari Expressway from Mauripur to the Super Highway.

According to the petitioners’ counsel, advocate Sanobar Ahmed, the government at the time of land acquisition had promised financial compensation and alternate plots for these people but had not followed through with its guarantees.

In 2003, the then president ordered the provincial government to compensate all affectees. The former city nazim had also directed the Lyari Expressway Rehabilitation Project appellate committee to consider petitioner cases for compensation and the allocation of alternate land but to no avail. The lawyer asked that the court should order the Sindh government and the CDGK authorities to pay monetary compensation and allot alternate plots to each affectee as promised.

The SHC division bench, comprising acting Chief Justice Mushir Alam and Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar, issued the notices.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 29^th, 2010.