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       KARACHI: As thousands of people are already living in houses constructed on small plots, each measuring less than 120 square yards, carved out illegally from the land owned by the Karachi Development Authority (KDA) through the notorious ‘china-cutting’ practice, the Pakistan Peoples Party government in Sindh has hinted at regularising these settlements, it emerged on Thursday.

       The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) and the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) had in 2015 investigated the encroachment of state land through china-cutting — a practice of slicing residential plots from state-owned encroached land especially amenity plots — but no meaningful action was taken due to the involvement of ordinary people who had bought the plots from organised groups.

       The issue comes under the spotlight again on Thursday when Local Government Minister Saeed Ghani held a meeting with top management of the KDA.

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       Informed sources told Dawn that the minister expressed concerns over the encroachment on the state land and asked the officials to devise a policy acceptable to all stakeholders.

       Fines on occupants of encroached land also discussed in meeting chaired by LG minister

       They said that since there was almost no possibility to get the state land evacuated with the construction of thousands of houses and shops on it, the proposal to regularise the buildings was deliberated upon in the meeting as the issue of ‘china cutting’ plots had been lingering on for the past many years.

       The sources said that the meeting also discussed the regularisation of encroached land by imposing fines on the occupants so that at least some funds could be generated for the KDA.

       They said that the KDA also requested funds for development of 139 parks in different parts of the city.

       The sources said that the proposal to hand over the parks to non-governmental organisation for adaptation was also discussed in the meeting.

       Meanwhile, the local government minister while chairing a meeting at the KDA head office said that the KDA should readily hand over six development schemes it had completed several years ago to the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation.

       He said the KDA shouldn’t retain these development schemes just to maximise its earnings.

       According to a press statement, Saeed Ghani said the Traffic Engineering Bureau, a subsidiary of the KDA, should give proposals for installing new traffic signals and adopting other measures for improving the vehicular traffic system in the city.

       He said the civil agency constructing the roads in Karachi should also receive the road-cutting charges.

       The LG minister said that the uplift schemes envisaged under the provincial Annual Development Programme should be completed in the shortest possible time to serve the people.

       In another meeting at the Sindh Building Control Authority, he asked the SBCA to explain its rules to determine the responsibility of illegal constructions across the city.

       He directed the SBCA officials to launch a public awareness campaign to inform people about unauthorised constructions in the city to prevent them from purchasing such properties for their accommodation.

       He said that relevant laws and rules should be amended wherever necessary to ensure stern lawful action against builders involved in unauthorised construction.

       SBCA Director-General Abdul Rasheed Solangi, told the minister that the SBCA had launched a one-window operation for approving building plans for residential buildings on 60 and 400-square-yard plots in Karachi within 15 days.

       He briefed the provincial minister that the complaint cell of the SBCA had been fully functional to help out the people having construction-related issues.

       The local government minister said that all officers including the SBCA DG should ensure punctuality and all officers and employees should work to correct the bad image of the authority in the public.

       Published in Dawn, March 29th, 2024