RAWALPINDI: The Rawalpindi Cantonment Board (RCB) has sought the federal government’s help to solve an issue relating to its boundary with Islamabad after residents living in the overlapping boundary area failed to pay tax to the civic body causing an annual loss of Rs357 million to it.

The RCB has written a letter to the federal government through the Ministry of Defence to play its role in getting the issue resolved between the Capital Development Authority (CDA) and the RCB.

A senior official told Dawn that the RCB had informed the ministry that in 1961 after shifting of the capital to Islamabad from Karachi and the establishment of the CDA the latter published the boundary limits of the capital city but transgressed into the cantonment limits by default.

On the other hand, the Cantonment Act 1924 clearly defined the boundaries of the cantonment limits as per a notification of the federal government. The federal government can check the record, he said.

People living in 2,500 acres on overlapping boundary do not pay tax causing an annual loss of Rs357 million to RCB, official says

The official said the disputed areas involved 2,509 acres and survey sheets of Survey of Pakistan for the years 1964, 1977, 1980 and 1985 also showed these localities with the RCB.

The letter stated that due to the overlapping of boundaries between Islamabad and the RCB, the latter was facing a loss of Rs357 million besides multiple administrative and security lapses hindering it to effectively perform its functions.

It said the situation was also putting pressure on the civic agency in execution of its development plan and provision of basic civic amenities to the residents.

During the census 2017, the residents of the localities tried to resist the census officials from Rawalpindi saying their areas fell in the jurisdiction of the federal capital. Police and army contingents were deployed to maintain law and order and to ensure smooth conduct of census said the letter.

The senior official added that the RCB had raised the issue with the CDA many times, especially during the first ever local government elections in the federal capital. However, he said, the issue was not resolved yet.

He said the boundary area between Islamabad and Rawalpindi Cantonment was more than 2,509 acres with the estimated population of 85,000.

“There are 2,532 housing and 471 commercial units but their owners are not paying tax to the RCB despite the fact that the civic body carried out development works on grants provided by the Punjab government in these localities.”

He said the areas fell in the limits of Rawalpindi police and in the provincial assembly limits. He said the provincial government had also released grants for the constituency in the past two decades.

Published in Dawn, August 17th, 2018