RAHIM YAR KHAN: The district administration has declared 10 lessees of the Market Committee (MC) in the old grain market defaulters due to non-payment of rent for the last one year.

The issue came to the knowledge of the administration and the MC last month when one of the 18 lessees claimed he was the owner of the shop. Officials, however, sprang into action and thwarted his bid to illegally claim ownership.

The market was established before 1960 on a piece of land of Karishna Cotton Industries which was later acquired by the government and the remaining land was sold out for Rahim Market. Initially, the grain market was under the administrative control of the deputy commissioner but after 1978, the secretary was made its head when its office was built.

District admin says it will remove encroachments

Many traders of the grain market said that in 1979, the then MC secretary, Iqbal Shah, converted this land of shed into 18 shops and obliged the traders by renting shops to them. These traders have been the lessees of the MC since 1979 and paying rent.

Sources said a lessee last year asked others to get ownership of these rented shops by using collective Khata No 347/347, and fulfilling other formalities.

According to secretary Mahar Mulazam Hussain, Jam Zahoor Elahi (shop 14) prepared an ownership document with the help of revenue department officials and also filed a writ petition in court for a stay on the basis of the claim that he was the owner of the shop through collective Khata of 92 kanal and 18 marla land of Rahim Market and MC did not collect rent or seal the shop. He said that after immediate legal response of the MC, his petition was disposed of.

He said in March, Assistant Commissioner (AC) Aitzaz Anjum sealed 10 shops of defaulter lessees Chaudhry Muhammad Saddique, Muhammad Faazal, Riaz Ahmed, Aftab Ahmed, Aslam Mohandra, Sanaullah, Abdul Mannan, Jam Zahoor, Mehboob Alam and Sheikh Mushtaq.

Meanwhile, newly established restaurants in the grain market are allegedly using the main platform of the MC for illegal commercial use with the support of an influential person.

AC Anjum told Dawn that these lessees stopped depositing the rent and claimed ownership but now they all have submitted applications that they will pay the rent with outstanding dues. After the clearance of dues, the shops will be opened, he said. He said he would visit the market and have the encroachments removed. The district administration, he said, would establish Ramazan Bazaar at the main platform of the market this year.

Published in Dawn, April 25th, 2019