THATTA, Feb 22: Sindh Minister for Revenue Dr. Irfan Gul Magsi said on Thursday that his ministry had so far vacated about 32,229 acres of state land encroached upon and occupied by land-grabbers in Karachi and Thatta.

The minister said while addressing a press conference at the Makli Circuit House that some 22,000 acres of state land in Karachi and 10,229 acres in Thatta had so far been vacated.

Six tapedars and four mukhtiarkars of Thatta out of a total of 23 tapedars and 11 mukhtiarkars throughout the province had been active in the land racket for a couple of years but many of them were now facing cases in courts, he said.

He denied outright any discrimination in the operation against land-grabbers and said that on his way to Thatta he had himself supervised bulldozing of boundary walls around an usurped piece of land near Dhabeji on the National Highway claimed by a Seth Zakria.

He said that the records of pieces of land claimed by an industrialist and a builder on the National Highway in Dhabeji were being scrutinised. They too would be brought to justice if found guilty, he said.

Mr Magsi said that 35,000 of total 60,000 villages, declared feasible after a survey conducted in 1987 under Goth Abad Scheme, would be regularised.

The government had revived the scheme after a gap of 10 years through an ordinance, he said and added that the project director of Goth Abad Scheme would camp for two days every month in Thatta to prepare Sanads (ownership deeds) of villages in the district.

He said that the department would consider genuine cases of villagers in Karachi, Thatta and Jamshoro and take steps to vacate state land usurped by land mafia in connivance with revenue officials and police.

The minister asked the EDO of revenue to prepare feasibility report about a journalists’ colony in Makli in response to a request made by the president of Thatta press club.