LAHORE, Jan 7: Scores of Santnagar residents took out a procession on Wednesday to condemn the alleged plan of annexing their colony for the Civil Secretariat, terming it a conspiracy to defame the PML-N and Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif.

They first gathered at the Islamia High School ground and later marched up to the Lahore commissioner’s office, raising slogans against the government and burning an effigy of Chief Secretary Javed Mahmood whom they held responsible for the plan to deprive them of their houses where their families had taken refuge in 1947.

Led by Dr Muhammad Arshad Meo, Mirza Salim Beg and Mr Ilyas Khan they carried placards and raised slogans against the chief secretary and the provincial government.

In their brief speeches, the three leading persons accused the chief secretary of turning the residents against the PML-N which they had always supported.

The residents were pro-PML-N and the chief minister must take notice of the ‘conspiracy’ through which they were being made to curse it, they said. They urged the chief minister to immediately intervene and stop the chief secretary and other officials concerned from pursuing their plan of snatching their residences for the expansion of the Civil Secretariat.

PML-N MNA Bilal Yasin who had won the election from the same constituency also came to the Islamia High School ground afterwards to show solidarity with the residents. He promised to talk to the chief minister on the issue, and convey to him their sentiments.

Meanwhile, Jamaat-i-Islami Naib Amir Liaquat Baloch has called upon Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif to review the decision to raze a school building to provide parking space for the Civil Secretariat in public interest.

In a statement issued here on Wednesday, he said the move to demolish school building and residential buildings for creating parking space for the Civil Secretariat was unwise.

He said the bureaucracy wanted a clash between the government and the people and had initiated the move for demolition of the school building for opening a new front for the purpose.

Baloch said it was the national duty of the government to protect the rights of the people and order shelving of the plan to demolish a pre-partition school building for the civil secretariat parking. The decision also deserved to be reviewed because it negated the government claim that it was making efforts for the promotion of education.—Staff Reporter