HARIPUR: The revenue department demarcated a disputed land here on Monday leading to the resolution of the issue over the ownership of the land proposed to be part of a road project.

Official sources said PK-41 MPA Arshad Ayub Khan had got funds approved for 15km Budhar-Danna Ferozpur Road in Jabri union council to benefit thousands of people in over a dozen villages.

The forest department didn’t issue NOC for the project claiming it owns the land. It also barred the contractor from blacktopping a few yards of the land.

However, the residents contested the forest department’s claim and said the land in question was the common property of Budhar villagers and the demarcation signs erected by the forest department were an encroachment on that property.

The land dispute also led to heated exchanges among former minister Yousuf Ayub Khan, elder brother of PTI MPA Arshad Ayub Khan and Haripur DFO Muddassar Hasan on Sunday afternoon.

The former minister accused the official of misbehaviour and threatened to lodge an FIR against him for forcibly making the forest’s land part of a road project. The official filed a written complaint with the Havelian police station accusing the former minister of attacking him in Budhar village.

However, official sources told Dawn that both sides reached a compromise in the deputy commissioner’s offices on Sunday night, where PTI MPA and DDAC chairman Arshad Ayub Khan, younger brother of Yousuf Ayub Khan, district police officer Syed Ashfaq Anwar, DC Nadeem Nasir and DFO Muddasar Hasan and officials of the district administration were in attendance.

Meanwhile, halqa girdawar Ehsanullah Khan insisted that the disputed land was located in Khasra No 962, which was the common property of Budhar villagers and not the forest department’s.

However, DFO Muddasar Hasan said the 1872 revenue records declared the forest department the land’s owner and that the MPA and his brother were reluctant to make it part of the proposed road project.

Published in Dawn, August 11th, 2020