These precious lands are occupied by various individuals and departments. The Railways owns 167, 690 acres land across the country.
According to a document submitted by the PR authorities to National Assembly Standing Sub-Committee on Pakistan Railways, individual parties occupy 2, 062 acres of the PR’s land, civil departments 441, 95 acres, while the armed forces hold 106.6 acres.
These parties have collectively encroached 816 acres in Lahore Division, 640 acres in Sukkur Division, 613 acres in Quetta Division, 274 acres in Peshawar Division, 139 acres in Karachi Division, 85 acres in Rawalpindi Division, 41 acres in Moghalpura Division and 5 acres in Multan Division, the official documents, available with The Express Tribune, reveals.
The document attributes this continued occupation to: “Inadequate Pakistan Railways Police force [and] lack of cooperation by district police and district administration to handle law and order situation during anti-encroachment campaign in certain provinces.”
“There is no resolution of title of Railways lands by provincial governments in accordance with Presidential Order No. 1 of 1970. It has resulted in tremendous litigation and indiscriminate granting of stay orders by the civil courts in land matters which halt the anti-encroachment operation,” the PR administration says.
According to the document, the PR administration is fighting against local influential people in Sukkur, who constructed illegal buildings on railway lands in Qamber Sahadad Kot.
“Sindh’s inspector general police has issued a strict directive to anti-encroachment cell Sukkur to help Railways to remove the unauthorised construction. “The administration have also approached Sindh governor and chief secretary to stop illegal construction of road near L-Xing on Nawabshah Sakrand Feeder Line Section and KM.507/9 to 508/14 between Sanghi-Panoakil Stations on Rohri-Khanpur Section,” the reorts says.
The sub-committee’s convener MNA Ramesh Lal of Pakistan Peoples Party also directed Railways administration to submit separately a detailed report on lands encroached by Pakistan Army in Rawalpindi and Lahore Division.
“We will submit this report to NA Speaker,” Ramesh Lal told The Express Tribune. “Our objective, as lawmakers, is to acquire reasonable income for the ailing railways from the encroached land no matter who is using it,’ he added. National Assembly sub-committee on October 10 would also go to visit a site with the PR officials, who claim have retrieved lands near Hassan Abdal, he added.
Land retrieved by Railways
The report reveals that railways administration retrieved 3, 000 acres of land from encroachers in two phases after Supreme Court took a suo moto notice in this regard in 2011.
The administration succeeded to retrieve 1, 865 acres of land in Lahore, 731 acres in Multan, 232 acres in Karachi, 121 acres in Peshawar, 110 acres in Sukkur, 60 acres in Rawalpindi, 25 acres in Quetta and 2 acres in Moghalpura.
Some 1, 358 acres lands were retrieved from private parties, 1, 255 acres from Pakistan Army and 436 acres lands from Pakistan Rangers. The PR authorities also assessed the value of retrieved land, which is Rs8.7 billion.
Published in The Express Tribune, October 9th, 2014.
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Where is Baby Bhatta?...er...Baby Bhutto? Is he taking notice of this? We know he and his father encroached Govt. land in Saddar, Karachi, And are building a high rise on it.
Our judicial system is the mother of all ills. Cases and stay orders pending for decades are a testament to the failure. A massive reorder is required which is beyond the capability of our political class.