KARACHI, June 6: A division bench of the Sindh High Court adjourned hearing of the Lyari Expressway case on Friday.

The six petitions moved by residents of the Hasan Aulia village will come up for further arguments by their counsel, M Ilyas Khan, on Saturday, while the remaining petitions by the residents of the PIB Colony, Sher Shah, Liquatabad and other areas would be taken up on June 16.

Advocate Ilyas Khan submitted that the village land was owned by the KMC and some of the petitioners had KMC’s lease letters, dated as far back as 1903. A martial law order (No 10 of 1982), which was protected by the eighth amendment to the Constitution, confirmed the leases. He also emphasized the role assigned to municipal councils and corporations in the development of slum areas by the Kutchi Abadis Act, 1979.

The bench observed that the main question was whether the KMC retained ownership of the land after the enforcement of the 1979 Act, which vested ownership of the Kutchi Abadi lands in the provincial governments and empowered them to declare a particular area a Kutchi Abadi, for development by local councils.

Not only were slum areas, stipulated to be notified as Kutchi Abadis by the provincial government, but schemes for their development were also to be drawn up by the Kutchi Abadis’ directorates, working under these bodies. The residents were to be granted lease, individually by the provincial government concerned.

The bench asked the counsel to meet the argument advanced by AG Anwar Mansoor Khan that the Hasan Aulia village land belonged to the provincial government and that it was neither transferred to kutchi Abadis’ directorate-general, nor a scheme was prepared for its development. The KMC, according to the AG, had no authority to lease out plots in the village.

PETITION DISMISSED: The SHC dismissed on Friday a writ petition moved by the residents of the Bizerta Lines area against the installation of an iron-gate by the Army Welfare Trust.