KARACHI: Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah on Tuesday ordered removal of encroachments along the route of the Karachi Circular Railway (KCR) and installation of barbed wire fence.

He took the decision while presiding over a meeting on the KCR and related issues at CM House.

The meeting was attended by Transport Minister Nasir Shah, Chief Secretary Rizwan Memon, Transport Secretary Taha Farooqui, GM of Railways Javed Anwar and other officials.

Minister Nasir Shah said the chief minister had already approved Rs45 million to conduct the feasibility of the KCR and that work was in progress.

The chief minister said the work of feasibility must be completed at the earliest so that the scheme could be submitted for CPEC-related projects.

Replying to a question, the minister said there were 2,600 small installations and 4,500 houses built along the KCR route while construction of new illegal establishments was still going on.

The chief minister said it was totally unacceptable and asked the chief secretary to get the encroachments removed on war-footing basis and start the installation of fence along the route.

The secretary transport said eight kilometres out of 48km-long KCR were encroached upon.

The chief minister asked him to get personally involved in the operation and keep submitting reports to him on a daily basis from next week.

The meeting participants were told that Railways’ land was under encroachment in Sukkur and Larkana as well.

The Railways’ representative sought support of the Sindh government for the removal.

The chief minister asked the chief secretary to order deputy commissioners concerned and get the Railways’ land vacated.

The meeting participants were told certain people in Sukkur and Karachi had fraudulently got ownership documents of the land owned by the Railways.

The CM asked the chief secretary to constitute a committee to inquire into the fraud and cancel the ownership, if it was found to be illegal.

Rs2.9bn for industrial areas

The chief minister on Tuesday approved a grant of Rs2.9 billion for the development and rehabilitation of infrastructure of industrial areas, mainly in Karachi.

The chief minister directed the industries minister to convene the Infrastructure Development Board, identify schemes, approve them and begin work under the joint supervision of the industrial area concerned and the provincial ministry.

“I would be releasing more funds if quality work is done before the end of current financial year,” he said at a meeting with a 10-member delegation of the Karachi Industrial Forum (KIF) led by Zain Bashir at CM House.

The chief minister said his government would provide them maximum funds if they come up with a detailed development plan.

“On your advice I had revived Industrial Development Board under the chairmanship of minister of industries to execute government-funded schemes,” he said, adding the delay was on the part of KIF which had not sent the development plan.

Published in Dawn, January 25th, 2017