Anti- encroachment drive: over 4,000 shops, structures razed to the ground: KMC

Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) Sunday said that as many as 4000 structures, including shops established on the encroached land or squatted, have been razed since the beginning of ongoing anti-encroachment operation amid protest by shopkeepers. The drive was conducted mainly around Saddar area, Burns Road, Aram Bagh, Khori Garden, Jamia Cloth Market, Dopatta Gali Market, Furniture Market, Akbar Road, Bolton Market etc, KMC officials said.
The anti-encroachment action around the Karachi Zoological Garden area entered its second day on Sunday. The officials said around 400 illegal shops and offices are being demolished there. The roof of a shop in the Garden area collapsed, when the people were taking out their valuables from the shop, eyewitness said. The other locations have already been cleared. The Garden area traders had already been informed to vacate the shops by Friday last but shopkeepers continued to protest against the anti-encroachment action. They said the KMC had earlier served them notices to vacate the shops within one month but now they abruptly slashed the deadline.
However, citizens, by and large, welcomed the KMC action against squatters and encroachers. In spite of public sympathy, operation teams had to face violent resistance from traders and land-grab mafias on different occasions. Even political parties, including the Mayor's Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) also criticised the action. The disgruntled erstwhile MQM-P leader Dr Farooq Sattar accused Wasim Akhtar of inflicting misery on the financially poor people. He accused the Mayor of exploiting the Supreme Court's order. Karachi Mayor Waseem Akhtar said that the 50-year-old rented KMC's shops built on amenity plots, nullahs and footpaths are now being removed in compliance with the Supreme Court (SC) orders. On January 2, Mayor Waseem Akhtar said the drive inflicted a huge revenue loss amounting to some Rs50 million to the funds-starved KMC.