ISLAMABAD: SC moved against forceful purchase of land in Murree

By Usman Manzoor

The people of Murree have once again knocked the doors of the Supreme Court of Pakistan to get their land rescued from a powerful housing society, which wants to build a golf club on the land by forcefully acquiring it.

A housing society has purchased some 3,333 kanals of land in a village named Salkhaiter in Murree to develop farm houses and a golf club. The society now wants to forcefully acquire the rest of 660 kanals of land of Salkhaiter, which has not been sold by the poor residents of villages because of their houses and ancestral graveyard.

Last year on August 21, the then-chief justice of Pakistan Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, along with three other judges of the Supreme Court, had stopped the housing society from forcefully acquiring the land of the poor.

Shafqat Abbasi, advocate, the lawyer of the villagers, told The News that last year the Supreme Court came to the rescue of the poor dwellers of Salkhaiter and after the unconstitutional step of November 3, 2007, the housing society had become once again active and had started acquiring land under the Punjab Private Site Development Scheme Rules 2005.

According to these rules, made by the Punjab Government in 2005, a housing society has been given permission to rest of the acquired land if it had purchased 80 per cent of the land of a particular area (Khasra).

The advocate said he had filed a petition in the Supreme Court that Nullah Korang, which passes through Salkhaiter, was the main source of water for Rawal dam. If any housing society was allowed to develop on land around the Nullah Korang, then it would affect the water supply to Rawal dam, the main source of water for over three million dwellers of Islamabad and Rawalpindi. He said on the same issue, the deposed chief justice had taken suo muto notice to rescue the poor dwellers and to save the environment and water supply to Rawal Dam.

The lawyer said that the housing society had not purchased 80 per cent of the land of Salkhaiter and, therefore, it could not acquire the rest of the land according to the Punjab government's rules. He said the previous Punjab government made the Private Site Development Scheme Rules 2005, which were ultra vires of Articles 3, 4 and 9 of the Constitution. He said the rules were made under the Local Bodies Ordinance and the LG Ordinance had nothing to do with the Land Acquisition Act.

Shafqat Abbasi said the Supreme Court was told that the land was neither being acquired for public purposes nor for the welfare of poor because, according to the scheme, the housing society would develop plots of five kanals each, which were not meant for the poor nor was the golf club.

He said the local Tehsil Municipal Administration (TMA) had to issue an NOC to every housing society but the said housing society was issued an NOC by the government servants of TMA and not the elected members who head the TMA, the Tehsil Nazim and Naib-Nazim. He said the society was free to develop the land which had been purchased by it but it should let dwellers of Salkhaiter to live in their houses and should not deprive residents of the village of their homes.
Courtesy: The News, 27/9/2008