PESHAWAR, Aug 26: The Peshawar High Court on Friday directed the district coordination officer to stop immediately all illegal constructions going on in different historical graveyards of the provincial capital.

A two-member bench comprising Chief Justice Ejaz Afzal Khan and Justice Waqar Ahmad Seth also sought the record of properties of the Auqaf Department and details of all the graveyards in Peshawar.

The chief justice had taken suo motu notice of the issue raised by a citizen, Arsalan Pasha, in his application a few weeks ago and converted it into a writ petition.

Later, representatives of Save the Graveyards Movement, including Ghulam Hussain Afridi, Azhar Ali Shah and others, moved another writ petition against the activities of land grabbers in different historical graveyards.

The bench adjourned hearing of the case till Sept 22 with the direction to the DCO to make it sure no further illegal construction should take place in any of the graveyard.

Peshawar DCO Mohammad Siraj and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Advocate General Asadullah Chamkani appeared before the bench and stated that a committee had already been set up to check these illegalities.

Mr Siraj said that the committee also included the district revenue officer and the SHO concerned as its members. He pointed out that in different localities they had removed the encroachments from graveyards over public complaints.

He also produced a letter, which he had sent to the secretary of the local government department, wherein he mentioned the steps taken for curbing the activities of land mafia.

The applicant, Arsalan Pasha, stated that some land grabbers had occupied his ancestral graveyard measuring over 12 kanals at Beri Bagh area.

The Save the Graveyards Movement (SGM) had made the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government through the chief secretary, the Auqaf Department, secretary local government and district coordination officer respondents in its writ petition.

The movement has requested the court to direct the officials concerned to impose Section 144 on digging and constructions in the graveyards.

It also requested the court to order construction of boundary walls around he existing graveyards and to remove the encroachments.

The petitioners prayed to the court to direct the provincial government for allocation of land for new graveyards keeping in view the increasing population. They added that burial in the available graveyards had become a serious problem for the citizens.

They claimed that Rehman Baba graveyard, the largest in the city, was originally spread over an area of 198 acres, but it had now been reduced to 74 acres.

The SGM was launched by the concerned citizens against the land grabbers, who were encroaching upon graveyards, and constructing houses and commercial buildings there. Its organizers stated that they had launched the movement due to silence of the relevant government departments over the land grabbing in various parts of the city.