LAHORE – A meeting of the National Assembly Standing Committee on Railways was held in Islamabad on Tuesday to review the progress of the Railways ongoing anti-encroachment campaign.
Railways Minister Haji Ghulam Ahmed Bilour, MNA Sardar Ayaz Sadiq, Railways Chairman Arif Azim, Railways GM Saeed Akhtar, Railways IGP Syed Ibne Hussain, participated in the meeting. Members of Standing Committee MNA Ramesh Lal, Begum Nasim Akhtar, Dewan Syed Ashiq Hussain, Afzal Sindhu and others were also present.
A statement issued from here stated that the performance of the PR campaign against illegal occupants was checked.
Meeting was informed that concerned Railways Divisional Superintendents in all the eight divisions and PR police had been jointly conducting operation against the encroachers. The meeting felt that operations against illegal occupants needed to be improved.
The Railways IGP said that from July 2011 to Dec 2011, the PR and PRP retrieved more than 299 acres of land worth billions of rupees while in February, 127 acres agricultural, residential and commercial railways land was retrieved. He said that Railways management had been facing severe resistance by the illegal occupants during the anti encroachment operations.
Meanwhile, PR Police retrieved more than 22 acres railway land from different sections. In anti-encroachment operations, it retrieved 16 acres from Peshawar Division, two acres and three kanals from Multan Division, 18 marlas from Lahore Division, 15 marlas from Rawalpindi Division.