RAWALPINDI: The Rawalpindi Municipal Corporation (RMC) on Tuesday approved development schemes of 46 union council chairmen worth Rs2 billion which would be launched in the six months.

The RMC council met with Deputy Mayor Chaudhry Tariq in the chair. Mayor Sardar Naseem Khan and all union council chairmen were present.

Mayor Khan directed all the chairmen to review the details of their schemes to ensure no bogus project is included in it and submit a report to him within a week.

PPP’s UC Chairman Anjum Farooq Paracha said the local administration had included uplift schemes in his union council which he had not recommended.

Mayor asks chairmen to review details of projects to ensure no bogus scheme included in it

He said he had not proposed any scheme for the MC Girls School in Bhabra Bazaar but in the documents Rs10 million had been set aside for it.

Raja Mushtaq, Ghayyur Akhtar Butt, Azhar Iqbal Satti, Malik Sultan Mahmood and Raja Hafeez and others criticised unchecked encroachments in the city and alleged that the chief municipal officer and the municipal officer regulations were responsible for it.

“We will clear the city from all temporary, permanent and immovable encroachments in a week if the elected members supported the administration,” said Imran Ali, the municipal officer regulations.

Upon this, the entire house, including the mayor, said there would be no political interference regarding removal of encroachments and directed the municipal officer to take action against encroachments with full powers and the local government representatives would support him.

Mayor Khan said the house would form a committee and divide the city into four sectors so the corporation would work on it without any delay.

The house approved removal of certain parking points in the city from the gazette notification on the resentment of traders and visitors and stopped the corporation from collecting parking fee from there.

These parking points are: the plot of old offices of RMC on City Saddar Road aka Jinnah Road, Fawara Chowk to Dangi Khoi, Iqbal Road from Committee Chowk to Chatian Hatian, Bani Chowk from Jamia Masjid Road to Pul Shah Nazar and 5th Road Rehmanabad Chowk to Tayba Hotel.

The house rejected a resolution of the municipal officer (finance) regarding increase in the general bus stand fee.

The mayor informed the house that for installation of tough tiles and construction of boundary walls in main graveyards Rs80 million had been allocated and the work would be started soon.

“Work on the new graveyard on 1,000 kanals at Rakh Dhamyal has been started at a cost of Rs20 million,” he said.

Published in Dawn, December 1st, 2021