DERA GHAZI KHAN, Oct 27: Villagers have dismantled the camps of Houbara Foundation (HF) which were established for the protection and sustainable hunting of houbara bustard in Mauza Patti Ghazi, in the limits Kot Mubarik police station.
According to details, local hunters are being stopped from hunting and netting falcon by officials of the Wildlife Department, HF and by members of those teams which come here every year before the visit of foreign dignitaries(who come here hunting). The foundation provides patrolling facilities to the field staff of the wildlife department.
Last week, members of the wildlife department, houbara foundation and official (arrangement) teams dismantled the camps set up by local people for netting houbara and falcon.
The Punjab Wildlife Department, it may be added, has already cancelled licences issued to the locals for hunting and netting of falcon.
In reaction, the locals removed the camps of the houbara foundation in Mauza Ghazi.
Dost Mohmmed Khosa, son of former Punjab governor Zulfiqar Ali Khan Khosa, has sent a protest memorandum to higher authorities of the wildlife department on behalf of the people of his tribe.
He levelled several charges on the field staff of the houbara foundation. He blamed that they were interrupting the daily life of the local people. He claimed the HF was also involved in the hunting of houbaras.
Police were ready to arrest the people involved in uprooting of the HF camps but did not act on the intervention of the Khosa chiefs, it was learnt. A villager told Dawn that the row between local hunters and HF-government teams had disturbed life in the area. “Villagers cannot move freely,” he claimed.
He said the Khosa chiefs were projecting the issue as a tribal matter but it was only a row between the hunters.
Operation: The Seraikistan Qaumi Movement has urged the army that it should stop its operation in the tribal area.
Speaking at a press conference on Sunday, Hameed Asghar Shaheen, the president of the SQM, feared that the operation might harm the country’s integrity.
He opposed the Greater Thal Canal, Kacchi Canal and Kalabagh Dam, which, he said, would render the Seraikis “as slaves of the Punjabi settlers.”
He said initial work on the Thal canal in 1953 had changed the demographic map of the area. “With the digging of the Greater Thal Canal, the Seraikis in Khushab, Bhakkar, Jhang and Layyah will be deprived of at least six PA and three NA seats,” he said.
He said the Kacchi Canal would also create differences between the Balochs and Seraikis because the latter had no right on the canal water, though it would pass through Muzaffargarh, Dera Ghazi Khan and Rajanpur.
The Seraiki leader also demanded establishment of independent high court, public service commission, revenue board, radio stations and television centres. He also demanded establishment of a Seraiki regiment in the armed forces.