KARACHI - Karachi Mayor Wasim Akhter on Sunday sought help from the Rangers to recover Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) land from grabbers after getting disappointed with the police efforts in this regard.
In a letter written to the Sindh Rangers director general (DG), the mayor said that a land mafia was trying to occupy 200 acres of KMC Officers’ Society, and that it had already occupied office of the Society in December 2019.
“We had complained to the Pak Colony police station on January 03. However, no action has been taken against the culprits since then,” Wasim wrote. He further said the KMC authorities had time and again launched drives against encroachments in the city and nabbed people for occupying the government land.
On Thursday, the Supreme Court (SC) had directed the Sindh government and Pakistan Railways (PR) to remove all encroachments, including all multi-story buildings that came in the way of Karachi Circular Railways (KCR) in order to revive the KCR. “We want to know what progress has been made on this front so far,” the CJP had asked.
Advocate General (AG) Sindh had told the court that the KCR had been included in the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) projects. “It is impossible to restore the KCR to its past position,” Sindh AG said. “There were 24 gates of the KCR most of which have been covered by encroachments,” he further said. “Why was the KCR not revived?” the chief justice asked the secretary railways, and added, “Instead of its restoration, the project was added to the CPEC.”
“The responsibility was taken by the government of Sindh,” the secretary said. “We don’t want to hear this, tell the court why the decision was not implemented,” the court asked. The court also warned of issuing the contempt of court notices to the Sindh chief minister, Mayor Waseem Akhtar and the secretary railways during the hearing.
