ISLAMABAD, Sept 9: Anjuman-i-Mazarain Punjab (AMP), the representative organization of one million tenants, has vowed to foil army’s move to buy around 23,699 acres of state land across the province.
Speaking at a press conference here on Tuesday, the AMP representatives quoting a source in the Board of Revenue said that the Punjab government planned to sell its land to the defence ministry.
They said due to the mounting pressure by the tenants for getting ownership rights, the army had decided to buy around 23,699 acres, comprising military farms.
They feared that after becoming ‘legal owner’ of the land, the army would throw the tenants out.
“If at all, the provincial government is willing to sell the farms, we are ready to pay the cost but will not allow the army to take the possession of the land,” they declared.
“We have been informed that the provincial government has agreed in principle to sell the land to the defence ministry at a cost of Rs300,000 per acre. The total cost of this land, therefore, will be slightly over Rs7.1 billion,” they added.
The AMP demanded of the government to disclose information about the source of Rs7.1 billion that would be spent on the purchase of the military farm land.
Given the current budgeted defence expenditure of Rs161 billion, the amount of Rs7.1 billion constituted about 4.5 per cent of the total budget, they added.
“This is a very large percentage that is being used for a purpose that clearly has little to do with the “national security”. This amount will ultimately come from the ordinary people’s pockets.
Quoting the BoR officials, they said the army did not need the total land area of 23,699 acres for the stipulated purpose of providing dairy products to the military.
In fact, the army already controls about 5,000 acres of land in Okara through which it meets its requirements sufficiently.
The BoR has also confirmed that the army had been illegally occupying these lands since 1943 when the previous lease agreement between the provincial government and the British army expired, they added.
The initial lease agreement was signed for 30 years in 1913, according to which the army paid the government of Punjab an annual sum of Rs15,000 for using the land.