RAWALPINDI - The local landowners have accused that authorities of Punjab Government Servants Housing Foundation (PGSHF) have initiated a housing project on their private land.
The local landowners said when they protested against the illegal occupation, deputy project director of the housing society with the help of Punjab government high-ups got registered a criminal case against them with Adyala police post controlled by Police Station Saddar Bairooni.
However, the deputy project director of the housing project denied the allegations, saying they had not occupied private land while the construction was being done only on the land demarcated by the Land Revenue Department to the housing project.
Iftikhar Ahmed, Ishrat Mehmood and Changez Akhtar, sons of late Abdul Khaliq, residents of village Hayyal, told TheNation on Saturday that authorities of Punjab Government Servants Housing Foundation (PGSHF) have illegally encroached their land measuring more than 60 kanlas out of 88 kanals and 6 marlas located at Dhoke Abullah, despite they had two court orders in their favor.
They said that they filed a petition with the court of Civil Judge Kashif Qayyum on 13/9/2012 and got stay order. However, the court canceled the stay order on October 18, 2012 after the statement of DPD that the housing authorities have not occupied on private land and was constructing boundary walls within the land demarked by the land revenue department for the housing project.
However, the deputy project director chewed his words and arrived on their land with labour and heavy machinery during night, placed their 8 chairs in the courtyard of their “Deera” (a house made with mud) and started digging the land for fixing the pillars, they said, adding that the deputy project director also off-loaded some 40 trolleys of soil to fill their two small fish ponds. They said that the deputy project director and his men ran away when they protested against the move.
They said that they again knocked the door of court of Rai Afzaal Hussain Kharal on 19/10/2012 and obtained fresh stay order which restrained the PGSHF from encroaching the land of petitioner/plaintiff illegally, forcibly and without due process of law and without valid demarcation till the next date of hearing.
But, the deputy project director instead of obeying court orders engineered a plan and got registered a fake case with police against them, they said. They termed all the allegations as baseless leveled against them by the deputy project director in the case. The three brothers demanded of Chief Justice of Pakistan Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, and Punjab Chief Minister Mian Shahbaz Sharif to take notice of the issue and provide them with justice.
Deputy Project Director PGSHF Jahangir, however, when contacted by this scribe for comments, said that housing authority did not encroach private land rather constructing boundary wall on the land demarcated by the land revenue department.
He said that land was given to PGSHF by the Punjab government in 2007 whereas the foundation started building houses for government servants in August 2009. He said that housing project authorities were installing pillars in the land cleared by land revenue department.
He said that he also stated the same before the court which allowed PGSHF to continue construction work. He alleged that the local landowners harassed the labourers by resorting aerial firing after which he got registered a case against them.
Commissioner Rawalpindi Division Imdad-ullah-Bosal and District Coordination Officer (DCO) Saqib Zafar did not receive their cell phones despite repeated attempts made by this scribe to get their version on the issue.
On the other hand, police, while taking action, arrested one servant of the local landowners and began hunt for nabbing the rest of the accused.