Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: The Minister of State (MoS) for Water and Power, Chaudhry Abid Sher Ali, encroached upon precious land of the Capital Development Authority (CDA). The land is worth millions of rupees and is situated at Nazimuddin Road in Sector F-10/4. The CDA admits illegality, but is unable to take action against the powerful minister.

Chaudhry Abid Sher Ali is a legal occupant of a house, number 27, measuring 511 square yards on the main Nazimuddin Road in Sector F-10/4 by sharing the ownership with his brother, Amir Ali since 1991.

The Minister of State illegally encroached upon around two ‘Kanals’ of precious CDA land, adjacent to his aforementioned residence and maintained a personal lawn on the site. The minister has also erected an iron fence around the said plot and restricted the public access on the land.

Nazimuddin Road is one of the expensive areas for living in the capital city and the price of the plot encroached upon is around Rs.120 million according to the property consultants working in the area, This land is being used by Chaudhry Abid Sher Ali and his family without paying even a single penny.

When contacted, the CDA enforcement wing’s Director, Taj Ahmed Warsi said: “We only take action on the directions of the directorate of urban planning in the case of encroached plots.”

He said further; “We did not receive any request regarding vacation of the plot encroached upon by Abid Sher Ali so far.”

On the other hand, rejecting the claim of the Director Enforcement, the Director Urban Planning, Ejaz Ahmed Shaikh said: “We have communicated the enforcement directorate for the vacation of all encroached plots on July 1, 2016, in general and now it is the responsibility of the enforcement wing to launch a comprehensive operation against the encroachers.”

It is a fact that a large number of plots located on several precious sites of the expensive sectors of Islamabad have been encroached upon by influential people under the umbrella of ‘approval for beautification and landscaping purposes’.

The CDA board in its meeting held on May 25, 2006, had decided to give permission to the general public for the beautification of land adjacent to their houses through gardening and plantation on a temporary basis, but it is pertinent to mention here that such approvals clearly include that nobody can chang the public access of the beautified plot.

Implementing the said decision of the CDA board in wrong direction, the householders bluntly misused the relaxation and converted the public land as their personal lawns and even constructed illegal structures in some cases, in convenience with relevant formations of the civic body, which is a violation of the spirit behind the decision.

The said approval for the beautification and landscaping was being used to facilitate and to favour the elite and influential people in the past on a massive scale as there is no centralised record available in the CDA as to how many licences have been issued in this regard so far and to whom these licences were issued.

Keeping the continuous loss and misuse of state land by individuals, the CDA board revoke its own decision on April 28, 2016, and cancelled all the approvals for beatification; whereas, the directorate of urban planning has also published a public notice in the national dailies to inform the masses regarding the updated decision.

The scribe tried to reach out to Chaudhry Abid Sher Ali, but he was unavailable to comment. However, a spokesperson at the Ministry of Water and Power, Muhammad Ismail, responded to the issue and said; “The Minister of State is a law obeying citizen and he will act according to law.”