Out on the streets

Farmers in Sialkot say that government has taken all their land but hasn’t even begun construction.

SIALKOT: Hundreds of land owners and villagers in the district have protested against the provincial government demanding they be compensated for their land that was acquired by the government for the establishment of the Sialkot-Lahore Motorway.

The protesters warned that they would go on a mass hunger strike and block the roads if the government failed to take serious notice of the situation. “It has been years since we’ve been waiting for the government to either return our land or give us compensation. They have no conscience. They turned us out of our homes,” said a protester Bilal Gohar.

A large group of affected villagers including Malik Yaqub, Ch. Abdul Hamid, Muhammad Boota, Riaz Ahmad, Maqsood Alam, Bashir Ahmad and Allah Rakha said that the government was treating them as its ‘step children’ and had confiscated their agricultural lands for establishing the motorway three years ago. “We now have no land and no motorway link. It was all for nothing,” said Malik Yaqub, adding.

“The government doesn’t seem to realise that this wasn’t just a piece of land. It was agricultural land… it was our livelihood.” Riaz Ahmed said, “They have left us with nothing and have closed all doors because we haven’t even been compensated.”

The villagers said that for the past two years they have been unable to cultivate any seasonal crops on their lands while the construction of the said motorway had not even been started. The district administration has confirmed that the situation has put hundreds of growers out of business and that they are facing a severe financial crisis.

“These men have been unemployed for nearly three years. There seems to be no sign that the situation will improve this year,” said district officer Kazim Butt.

Construction on the Rs40 billion grand mega project of a 100-km long Sialkot-Lahore Motorway has not begun.

Former president Pervez Musharraf inaugurated the project during his visit to Sialkot on April 11, 2007 with a pledge to start construction as soon as possible. The fate of the project still remains uncertain as the incumbent government has not commented on its progress.

According to officials, the inordinate delay in this regard has raised the cost of the Sialkot mega project from Rs23 billion to Rs40 billion and the provincial government lacks the required funds to pursue it fully.

The existing political scenario has also brought the status of the Sialkot-Lahore Motorway project into question as the Sialkot business community has expressed fears that the endeavor will be politicised. “The motorway is a necessary and important venture and many people have made sacrifices for it. If the government scraps it now then the suffering of the villagers will have been for nothing,” said Sialkot chamber of commerce member Nadeem Shah.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 4^th, 2010.