RAWALPINDI: The Chaklala Cantonment Board’s (CCB) has turned a blind eye to commercial activity in its residential areas, despite the problems it is causing residents.

Workshops, schools, salons, boutiques and offices are operating in Chaklala Scheme III, Lalazar, Nayyar Colony and other nearby areas despite directions from the federal government to shift them to commercial areas.

Under cantonment laws, commercial outlets cannot be established in residential areas, and commercial activity should be limited to marketplaces.

According to Chaklala Scheme III resident Mohammad Anwar, the CCB has not taken action against private offices operating in residential areas that have caused traffic problems for residents.

“A commercial market has been constructed in Chaklala Scheme III, but most people are running their businesses in private houses to evade taxes,” he said.

Samar Malik from Lalazar said private schools that dot residential streets were not serving people, but were creating problems for local residents.,

“We have to look for alternate routes every morning and afternoon due to the queues of cars and school vans parking in front of houses,” he said.

A senior CCB official told Dawn commercial activity is banned in residential areas, but entrepreneurs were turning private houses into commercial units without approval from the civic authority because residential units are taxed less than commercial units.

“Retired government officials in Chaklala Scheme III and adjoining areas have turned their houses into commercial outlets and failed to pay taxes, as government servants are not required to pay property tax on residential units in their personal use,” he said.

CCB Vice President Raja Irfan Imtiaz said the board’s elected members would raise the issue at the next board meeting, since it was inconveniencing citizens who had reached out to the board.

He said that it was mostly former government employees who have turned their houses into private clinics, which generated medical waste and was putting the health of local residents at risk.

“Schools and beauty parlours in the posh localities of Chaklala Scheme III will be shifted to the commercial area or a new fee will be imposed on them to use residential houses as commercial outlets,” he said.

Published in Dawn, November 22nd, 2017