RAWALPINDI: The Rawalpindi Development Authority (RDA) on Saturday decided to get compensation from the Punjab government for using its land for the establishment of a gynae centre and filter clinic.

The gynae centre and filter clinic constructed at Sherpao Colony is functioning under Benazir Bhutto Hospital (BBH). Besides, a college is also constructed on RDA land at Jhanda Chichi, Civil Lines.

In 2011, the then Punjab chief minister Shahbaz Sharif laid foundation of a 200-bed Mother and Child Hospital at Sherpao Colony near Committee Chowk where a veterinary hospital and middle school were functioning. The veterinary hospital was shifted to Sihala while students of the middle school were accommodated in another government school in Arya Mohallah.

But slow funding forced the government to convert the hospital into a gynae centre and filter clinic of the BBH in 2014.

Gynae filter clinic, college have been set up on 14 kanals owned by civic body, says official

On Saturday, RDA Director General Abdul Sattar Issani visited two housing schemes - Sherpao Colony and Civil Lines Scheme - in the area and reviewed grievances related to the occupation of the land.

He called on the RDA Land Development and Estate Management Director Saima Younus and directed her to retrieve the government land from the land mafia.

He also directed her to issue letters to officers concerned pertaining to the gynae centre and filter clinic in Sherpao Colony and Jhanda Chichi College at Civil Lines Scheme. The land should be recouped or its current price recovered, he added.

When contacted, Director Saima Younus said eight kanals was used for the construction of the gynae centre and filter clinic in Sherpao Colony and six kanals for the Jhanda Chichi College at Civil Lines Scheme. She said the land belonged to the RDA and this had been brought in the notice of the government repeatedly in the past.

She said the RDA had also written letters to the education department to pay compensation against the land being used by its three schools near Committee Chowk.

She said a summery would be sent to the Punjab government after making estimates of the land price soon.

Published in Dawn, February 28th, 2021