KARACHI: Traffic police have only 24 forklift trucks to tow away any of the 3.8 million vehicles in the metropolis parked in the tow-away zones, said SSP Traffic (South) Captain Faisal Chachar during a consultative session on the issue of encroachment in Karachi on Saturday. SSP Chachar spoke on a number of issues that the city traffic police faced while managing road traffic in areas illegally occupied by vehicles.

He explained that service lanes on Beaumont Road, Teen Talwar, Dau Talwar and Zamzama were all encroached upon by vehicles of businessmen and shop owners. They parked their vehicles but did not want to pay charges, he said. “We have held marathon meetings with the business and traders communities and yet there hasn’t been any progress. The cars and motorcycles are still parked where they were months ago,” he said. Even if the cars were towed away from these spots, there were not enough lifters available to do the job, he added.

He said that 908 vehicles were registered on a daily basis in the city which had an overall vehicle population of 3.8 million. Only 3,500 traffic policemen were there to ensure that vehicles do not take up the service lanes, he added.

About the increasing number of vehicles in the city, urban planner with Shehri, Farhan Anwar, said a lack of alternative transport system for the people was causing the rise of vehicles which was also adding to the existing encroachment problem.

“Encroachment is part of a much larger issue. We are basically looking at the symptom the actual cause of which is lack of planning and governance. We have to ask why the problem is not going away,” he said.

Sharing pictures of various encroachments across the city in his presentation, Mr Anwar said there were certain places which began as encroachment but were then legalised. In many parts of the city, he said there was an organised invasion of pavements and walkways by cars and motorbikes. “Apart from that, in the past 15 years, we have seen a rise of departmental stores across the city and the traffic spillover is another form of encroachment which everyone sees but no one wants to complain about,” he added.

In one of the pictures, he shared, a roundabout near the Board of Secoundry School Education office in Nazimabad was turned into an eatery known as Burger King. “This is a high point of encroachment. I must also add that back in 2003, urban planners and activists spoke against the commercialisation of 17 roads by the city government. What we are seeing at the moment is the strip commercialisation that we opposed back then,” he added.

Dr Raza Ali Gardezi, another member of Shehri, said people should lodge complaints if they saw encroachment. He quoted anti-encroachment laws such as the Sindh Public Property (removal of encroachment) Ordinance 1975, Police Act of 1861 and Sindh Local Government Ordinance 2013, under which a common man could lodge complaints and a law enforcer could take action. “Otherwise, we’ll end up organising seminars until our right to do so is also encroached upon,” he added.

The seminar was organised by Shehri-Citizens for a better environment.

Published in Dawn, November 29th, 2015