SC orders removal of billboards from footpaths again

All billboards to be removed within a week

KARACHI: The Supreme Court has once again directed the removal of all billboards from footpaths across the city, seeking a report on the order's implementation within a week.

On Thursday, a two-member bench, comprising Justice Amir Hani Muslim and Justice Anwar Zaheer Jamali, took up the case at the apex court's Karachi registry.

During the hearing, officers of the federal, provincial and local authorities appeared and submitted their reports, as sought by the court earlier.

Read: Billboards go down as city expects first monsoon

The officers of the Rangers and the Coast Guards categorically denied that they had given anyone permission to place advertisement boards on the land they maintained. The court was given incorrect information, they asserted.

The representative of the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) told the court that they had allowed billboards on greenbelts only. However, the bench questioned how the boards were erected on footpaths if the KMC had not done so.

It seems that authorities have turned their attention towards money making, the bench observed. They do not seem to care about the people who fall prey to such boards whenever a natural calamity hits.

Reading the report, the court questioned the official representing the police regarding the law under which police stations were providing spaces to billboards.

Read: SC orders to remove all billboards from Karachi's footpaths

The police officer replied that the money generated through the boards was utilised in the police welfare fund, however, after the court's order all such hoardings were removed.

The bench, in return, expressed displeasure and observed that the police too may start developing plazas and starting businesses if that was their intention.

The bench, concluding the hearing, ordered that all billboards on footpaths should be removed within a week.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 21^st, 2015.