November 21, 2007	Wednesday	Ziqa’ad 10, 1428

KASUR, Nov 20: A decision by the Kasur Tanneries Waste Management Agency (KTWMA) to acquire over 400 acres from private owners to establish Phase-II of the Water Treatment Project instead of utilising state land available adjacent to the proposed site has sparked qualms among the locals.

This was revealed in a legal notice issued to the Punjab Environment Department director general with a copy endorsed to the environment secretary on Nov 17 by Advocate Bakhtiar Kasuri, who is the younger brother of former foreign minister Mian Khurshid Mahmood Kasuri.

According to the legal notice, the KTWMA had decided to acquire land measuring 413 acres belonging to Faqiriawala, Toolowala, Doulewala and Kotli Pathanan villages to execute Phase-II of the existing project instead of utilising government land lying vacant adjacent to the existing plant at Bhadurpura drain ‘for the reasons best known to the district administration’.

The residents of these villages have protested the decision and have urged the authorities concerned to spare their private lands and instead utilise the available state land.

Mr Kasuri has stated that KTWMA was not running the Phase-I of the existing project properly and that the industrial effluent was being discharged without treatment directly into watercourses. There was ample evidence available that the effluent was rendering the land on which it was being discharged since 2001 baron and infertile and was equally harming the aquatic life.

The legal notice said it also seemed ironical that in order to facilitate the livelihood of tanning industry, landowners were being deprived of their livelihood in the process.

Meanwhile, members and office-bearers of Anjuman-i-Kashtkaran Kasur, including Chaudhry Ahmad Ali Toloo, Muhammad Muzaffer Chaudhry, Maqbool Ahmnad, Khadim Husain, Liaqat Ali and others held an emergency meeting at the organisation’s office in Toloo Wala locality on Tuesday.

They said the government had failed to provide protection to the rights and properties of the people at large and instead it was depriving them of opportunity to earn their livelihood.

They warned the government to withdraw their decision promptly, otherwise they would come on the roads to protect their rights.

When contacted, Project Manager Col Muhammad Rafiq (retired) said the KTWMA had not taken decision regarding the acquisition of private land as yet. He also denied that state land existed in the vicinity of site of the proposed project.

He said that KTWMA was not authorised to take any decision regarding the acquisition of land rather it was provincial government’s sole prerogative.

However, he said the project was meant for the betterment and welfare of the people of Kasur.

He said the feasibility of the proposed project was in the pipeline and the agency, through advertisements in the media, had invited public objections from civil society and if the project was found infeasible, it would be shelved.