May 23, 2007	Wednesday	Jamadi-ul-Awwal 06, 1428

LAHORE, May 22: Residents of Dhaid Pind, a village opposite the new airport, on Tuesday accused a provincial minister of occupying their lands to build a road for his housing society.

They warned violence could erupt if the minister tried to bulldoze their houses for the road.

Addressing a press conference, they said Abdul Aleem Khan, provincial information technology minister, eyed the 200-year-old village after he had built his housing society here in the 1990s. They said the society had recently been taken over the Defence Housing Authority.

They alleged the minister had occupied 16 acres of Muhammad Safdar and another four acres of Baba Meraj Din, who was shot on resistance. The Baba survived, but has become handicapped ever since. Similarly, one acre of Muhammad Bashir was occupied by the minister when he went on Haj.

Aleem Khan occupied the land with the help of his private army and police, they alleged.

Mr Khan gave plots to bureaucrats, army generals and police officials in his society for their favours, they claimed.

The residents said they had protested against the minister’s highhandedness on April 21. Following the protest, 10 protestors were implicated in a murder case for the death of a man on May 25. They said the man had died in a traffic accident.

The resident appealed to the president and the prime minister to save their village from the “qabza group” of the minister and also launch an inquiry into his becoming a “phenomenally rich” in a few years.

They claimed over 250 acres were lying vacant adjacent to the village which he should have used for the road. They alleged the minister wanted to raze their houses to improve aesthetic look of his society oblivious of the fact that it would throw people in the open.