An intensive crackdown against illegal buildings inside Walled City, Lahore continue on by the Walled City of Lahore Authority (WCLA). On Friday, the authority has partially demolished four illegal plazas inside Masti Gate along with complete demolition of encroachments. The operations against illegal constructions especially plazas were launched by WCLA during Ramazan. The operation team comprised of police personnel and the staff of building control department of WCLA. In the recent operation against the illegal constructions inside the Walled City, the partially demolished properties were F-2164, C-1873, C-1876 and E-46. Further, four temporary encroachments were completely demolished which were located on the main drain line of Akbari Gate, Thara in Wacho Wali, Quarter 4 behind Tibbi Thana and Choori Bazaar. According to details, over the past two weeks, 11 plazas have been partially demolished, three permanent and four temporary encroachments in different parts of Walled City have been demolished by the Building Control Department of WCLA. These operations were spearheaded by WCLA conservation director and Building Control deputy director along with police force. WCLA Conservation & Planning Director Najam Saqib said that as per the section 32 of WCLA Act 2012, these operations were being carried out to erase the illegal constructions from the city. He said that WCLA would be starting demolition operations on daily basis from this week. He mentioned that these operations are giving an aggressive message to the plaza mafia and illegal property owners and more operations would make an impact in controlling the new illegal constructions. “We are moving randomly to different parts of the city and are also prioritising the illegal constructions to be demolished. So far we have been partially demolishing the plazas but now we will be moving forward to complete demolition of all the illegal plazas. We have listed the illegal constructions which are a threat to the neighbourhood and historic fabric and those are on our hit list. He further said that all the operations are in accordance with the WCLA Act and we did issue the notices for personal hearings and map approval to most of the illegal property owners. This is an ongoing process now and we will not be sparing any illegal construction inside the walled city, and our team is on aggressive surveillance to keep a check on illegal constructions which take place at night, Najam Saqib concluded. Published in Daily Times, June 23rd 2018.