KARACHI, Jan 17: The executive district officer (Revenue) of the city government has asked the authorities concerned to remove encroachments from the lands of various housing societies and state in Gulzar-i-Hijri (Scheme-33) within 15 days.

EDO Mohammad Waseem issued this instruction while presiding over a meeting of the Gulzar-i-Hijri Cooperative Housing Societies Federation in his office.

The meeting decided to seek the help of a large number of personnel from the Rangers and police to vacate the land in Scheme-33 which belonged to different housing societies as well as the state.

It was decided that the district officer (Revenue) would approach the city Nazim to seek help of the Rangers and police in this regard.

It was further decided that after the removal of encroachments, the land would be handed over to the societies. The societies would look after their land and maintain a watch and ward.

The EDO (Revenue) asked the societies to submit details about the encroachment of their land within seven days so that the removal of encroachment could be undertaken in time.

Earlier, agreeing to the demand of the societies federation, the EDO asked the executing officers to make serious efforts for urgent execution of development works in Scheme-33.

It was decided that the ED (Revenue) would immediately convene a meeting of the executing officers of Scheme-33 to chalk out a crash programme for development works at the scheme.

The Mukhtiarkar (Revenue) told the participants that land grabbers were selling plots on many sites in the scheme despite attempts to control it.

These efforts could not bear fruit due to non-cooperation of the Police Department. He suggested a large-scale use of Rangers and police personnel for the removal of encroachments from the state and societies land worth billion of rupees.

Representatives of the societies said that they had paid the cost of outer development long ago, but no proper work had been carried out. This had encouraged the land mafia to encroach upon lands of the societies, and the owners could not start construction on their plots. - APP