MUZAFFARABAD, April 18: AJK Legislative Assembly here on Tuesday called upon the federal government to withdraw the proposed arbitrary increase in the rent of evacuee properties inhabited by refugees from the occupied Jammu and Kashmir in Punjab.

The unanimous demand was made through a resolution tabled by AJK Minister for Auqaf Hafiz Mohammad Hamid Raza who represents the refugees from held Jammu settled in Sialkot and adjoining areas.

The minister pointed out that hundreds of refugee families were living as tenants in the properties controlled by Pakistan government’s Evacuee Trust Property Board in different parts of the Punjab.

These families were regularly paying the rents but lately the Sialkot-based assistant administrator for such properties had issued notices, asking them to pay according to new ratio, as high as 600 per cent in some cases, from July 1, 2006.