ABBOTTABAD: The local administration demolished a multi-storey plaza and 20 newly-built shops and retrieved five kanals commercial land with an estimated value of Rs200 million during an anti-encroachment campaign at Khoker Maira on the Karakoram Highway (KKH) near Havelian interchange here on Wednesday.

The officials of revenue department, National Highway Authority and police were present on the occasion.

This was the second such drive in a month by the local administration in which precious state land was recovered from land grabbers who were allegedly backed by a political personality of the province. Earlier, one kanal commercial land was recovered from a police constable at Muslimabad.

Assistant commissioner Mohammad Hassaan Ahsan supervised demolition of the illegally built plaza and 20 shops. He said on the occasion that the operation was conducted after fulfilling legal requirements while the NHA had already served notices on the people involved in illegal constructions.

“We have a documentary proof of serving and receiving the notices issued by theNHA,” he said.

Answering a question, the assistant commissioner said that Sajid Khan, Saleem Khan, Dr Mushtaq andJamshed Khan were involved in this illegal construction.

Earlier, NHA’s deputy director (legal) in his letter addressed to the assistant commissioner had requested for support in the anti-encroachment drive at Goharabad. He had stated that a revenue official and a surveyor of NHA had visited the spot and noticed the encroachment.

Published in Dawn, December 9th, 2021