Court orders students to be moved out of old building

Woman claims ownership, wants to demolish the “unsafe” structure.

KARACHI: The Sindh High Court has ordered the city government to vacate a 120-year-old school building and find another campus for its students.

A woman had submitted a petition that the building is dilapidated and was declared dangerous by the Karachi Building Control Authority. She had filed a constitutional petition, claiming ownership of the Government City Boys Secondary School building at 3/19, Sarai Road, Quarters Housing, over the last 35 years.

She maintained that the building has been declared unfit for habitation since the mid 1980s by architects and the government has ordered for the building to be handed over to the petitioner/owner for demolition.

On Tuesday, City District Government, Karachi’s EDO Education was directed by the Sindh High Court to move the students to any other school in the vicinity immediately after the winter vacation and to report to the court in the next three weeks.

The antiquities department secretary appeared before the court for the second time on Tuesday and submitted details about the school’s structure and other issues. To a query by the court, he submitted that the provincial government can be appointed a guardian “to look after the building which has been included in the list of protected heritage sites and thus could not be touched under the Cultural Heritage Preservation Act 1994”.

The division bench examined the report by the commissioner appointed for inspecting the school building. The bench inquired about the interests of the petitioners and the government and the dilapidated condition of the building. It was told that the 1994 act does not address the issue of ownership, or ‘transfer of interest’ if a building has been declared dangerous.

The bench then directed the EDO Education to make necessary arrangements as soon as possible to shift the students to schools in the vicinity immediately after the winter vacation and to submit a compliance report within three weeks after moving them.

Alleged encroachments case

Separately, the division bench also heard another constitutional petition filed by Al Fayyaz Modern Academy principal Qamar Jahan on the alleged attempt to encroach on ST plots (commercial plots) owned by the government

Jahan maintains that she had erected a boundary wall on two plots in front of her school as it was being grabbed by the land mafia. She offered a market price to the authorities but she received no reply, the petitioner submitted. Now some people are digging up the same plots, she added.

When the petition was taken up for hearing, the bench was informed that respondents, including the Korangi Town administrator, were not in attendance even though many notices had been issued. Issuing notices to the respondents, the bench ordered that no construction can take place on the disputed plots till a decision was made.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 24^th, 2010.