KARACHI, July 6: In a brazen act of trespassing, police have occupied a newly constructed double-storey school building where classes were scheduled to commence in August.
The city government has established the school in North Nazimabad Town in view of the longstanding demand of local residents.
“It is shocking to note that the police have taken over the building before our wards could have a seat for learning,” some of the upset people of the area said.
Located in Block-F of North Nazimabad on Rasheed Turabi Road, the building has been constructed at a cost of Rs11 million put in by the City District Government Karachi over a period of three years.
It has 10 big classrooms, separate rooms for headmaster and teachers, spacious science laboratory, library, workshop, drawing hall and an auditorium.
The school project was formally inaugurated by provincial Minister for Planning and Development Syed Shoaib Bukhari on August 13, 2005.
“We were all set to launch teaching up to class X at the school, meant for 300 to 400 girls, from August 16 after summer vacation, but the occupation of the building by police has upset the plan,” said a senior city government official. The Education Works Department of the city government had been trying to sort out the issue for more than five months but in vain, he added.
The police have so far shifted a police check-post to the school building, but the residents feared their hectic activity and increasing operation indicated that they were in no mood to vacate the place. They also feared that their wards might be deprived of a great opportunity of having the high school education facility within the neighbourhood if the relevant authorities failed to get the building vacated from ‘these uniform encroachers’.
The Duty Officer of the Hyderi Market police post which has been housed in the school building said that after the police-post was dismantled at the previous site, the police found the school building ‘appropriate’ for their purpose.
“We know that the property is a school building and has to be restored to the education department of the city government, but there is no harm in using it as a police station till the time we get some alternative place,” he argued.
The school has been named after Haji Mohammad Zakariya and built on an ST plot measuring about one acre. In official files, it has been categorised as a double-section high school.
Police have been using at least two big rooms for their offices and some other rooms as retiring/living rooms.
Sources in the education department said that the building in question had been completed in all respects last year.
“In addition to undertaking new admissions for classes VI to IX, we have also planned to shift students of a school situated in Block-6, F B Area, to the new school,” said the source, explaining that the school building in Block-6 was in a precarious condition.
He maintaining that in order to avoid any harm to the students and teachers of that school, the government has already decided to reconstruct it.
Regarding restoration of the school building to the education department, an official confided to Dawn that all the forums concerned had been moved during the past few months.
He stated that a senior minister had also written to the authorities that the matter be sorted out, but nothing could make the police to quit the building, he added.
When contacted, the concerned DO of Education Works told Dawn that in response to a letter in January last, the than TPO of North Nazimabad had replied to him that the police had taken over the premises after getting permission from the town nazim.
The DO quoted the TPO as saying that a request in this regard had been made to the town nazim who gave the permission accordingly.
KARACHI, July 6: In a brazen act of trespassing, police have occupied a newly constructed double-storey school building where classes were scheduled to commence in August.
