KASUR: The Kasur Tehsil Municipal Corporation has asked scores of owners and investors of land at about 10km long Ferozepur Road bypass that links Raiwind and Deepalpur roads, to stop commercial activities.

The Lahore Development Authority (LDA) started the two-lane dual carriage bypass in 2014 with a cost of Rs1.5 billion.

Owners of 71 buildings doing commercial activities in violation of the Local Government Act of 2019, have been issued notices in the initial phase.

Nowadays, landowners are holding corner meetings as part of their anti-administration movement. On Monday, they also staged a protest demonstration on Raiwind Road roundabout.

Due to the lack of communication between administration and owners of the properties, some officials of the municipal committee started minting money from these owners and investors promising that they would halt the operation.

The land on the Kasur bypass has been sold like hot cakes for the last one year after some food chain outlets and private institutions started their business here. The price of land soared from Rs500,000 to Rs2.5 million per marla.

A few months back, the LDA also launched a crackdown on the structures raised illegally (without getting them commercialized). Later, Chief Minister Usman Buzdar, through an order, barred the LDA from taking any action in Kasur, Sheikhupura and Nankana Sahib districts.

Deputy Commissioner Asiya Gul said the administration was striving to let the traffic flow smoothly and without interference from local traffic. She added the administration wanted to reduce congestion on the bypass caused by commercial structures. She said if the situation persisted, the bypass would be converted into an ordinary town road.

She said that the land could be used for residential purposes following certain parameters.

She also claimed she would also fix responsibility on the municipal committee officials, including enforcement officers and land officers, who allowed these commercial activities.

Some investors and owners requesting anonymity said they were ready to pay a commercial fee. They also said that they had invested billions as the administration let the commercial activities go ahead, collected revenue against the sale deeds of commercial land.

They also said that LDA officials had also been forcing them to get the properties commercialized.

They said during the last few years none from the district administration informed them about the status of the activities.

They lamented that many investors had invested here their life savings.

An investor told Dawn that even at present the administration was serving them notices and threatening them with strict action but it had no solid plan for the investors in terms of what can be said legal use of property at the bypass.

They also lamented the lack of awareness and the gap of communication between them and the administration.

Deputy Commissioner Gul said she would establish a team headed by the assistant commissioner to coordinate with the affected owners and investors to address their grievance.

However, she said, commercial activities were out of question.

Published in Dawn, June 29th, 2021