TOBA TEK SINGH: A team of the district administration on Friday demolished dozens of houses which had been illegally built for the last 50 years at Tibba Singarwala on land allotted to the archaeology department.

The land near Ravi was allotted to the department under the control of Harappa museum.

The operation was led by Deputy Commissioner Umer Javed and Kamalia Assistant Commissioner Irfan Hinjra.

Archaeology department deputy director Muhammad Hassan told Dawn that 660 artifacts of different nature had been discovered during excavations at the place. These included terracotta objects such as big and small bowls; human moulds; animal and human figurines; clay beads; iron objects; bangles of shell, glass and copper; and stone objects consisting of pestles and whetstones, he said. He claimed that the ceramic assemblage from stratified layers showed their utilitarian nature.

Despite several notices to the people who encroached upon the land and built houses on Kamalia’s centuries-old mound (Tibba Singarwala), he said, they were not vacating the archaeology department land. He said Harappa Museum Curator Ahmad Nawaz Tippu had apprised the DC that 20 acres of land had been allotted to the archaeology department which was shown in Kamalia tehsil’s revenue record of Jamabandi of 2008 but the encroachers wrongly claimed that they had been owning the land for the last several decades.

Hassan further said the antiques dating back from fourth to 16th century had been discovered during the initial excavation of the mound by an archaeology department team headed by himself which started excavation in 2010 and completed in 2011. He said Tibba Singarwala was 45 feet high from the surrounding area and about 70 to 80 houses including cattle pens had been constructed on it without any approval.

Before starting excavations, he said, notices were issued to the mound dwellers to vacate the land under the Antiquities Act 1975. He said according to the Supreme Court order, the DCs were responsible for the removal of encroachments in and around any historical site or monument indicated by the archaeology department in their respective districts.

He further said the dwellers had filed a case in the court of a Toba civil judge seeking stay against the department but their plea was turned down due to the documentary proof of the department. After the case was rejected by the lower court, the district administration tried to demolish the illegal houses under section 32/34 of Colonies Act but the locals resisted on the plea that it was an attempt to occupy their land. He said the land had now been preserved for further excavation.

Meanwhile, Kamalia’s human rights activist Tariq Imran condemned the demolition of houses of the poor and said they had been punished for not voting for the ruling party candidates during last general election. He demanded alternative land for those affected by the operation.

TORTURE CASE: A police cell at Pirmahal claimed on Friday to have arrested four of the 13 people who tortured a woman, her husband and a son at a market.

The woman complained in the FIR lodged under sections 354, 337, 148 and 149 of PPC that his son and a vendor quarreled over parking rickshaw at grain market. The suspect, along with his 12 accomplices, injured them and tore her clothes, she said.

Published in Dawn, September 4th, 2021