IHC orders CDA to demolish traffic police pickets set up on green belts

ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) Tuesday ordered the Capital Development Authority (CDA) to demolish traffic police pickets set up on green belts in various areas of the federal capital.

The court also summoned the Mayor Islamabad in person on Thursday.

At the outset of hearing of a petition regarding kiosks set up in the federal capital, the IHC bench comprising Acting Chief Justice Aamer Farooq and Justice Mohsin Akhter Kiyani observed that the CDA officers had sought a one-day time in the case, but they had failed to assist the court on the matter.

The CDA’s lawyer pleaded before the court that the civic body had cancelled the licenses of kiosks in 2013 and demolished the same in 2015.

Justice Kiyani observed that the court was not being informed the actual situation as some kiosks were still present in sectors G-6/3 and G-6/4.

Justice Aamer Farooq asked whether all the kiosks were being removed or the action was being taken on the basis of likes and dislikes.

Addressing the CDA’s member planning, he questioned as to who had issued licenses for the kiosks in the past. The CDA had become a joke, he added.

The CDA’s officer requested the court to grant some time to answer its questions.

Justice Aamer Farooq observed, “No one would go home today, the bench would initiate a contempt of court proceeding against the responsible for issuing kiosk licenses.”

He observed that the CDA had recently issued notices to many kiosk owners to deposit their outstanding dues and it was saying that those (kiosks) were all illegal. The CDA officers were just for making money, he remarked.

The court observed that the Supreme Court had ordered to remove encroachments from green belts not the kiosks. This bench would issue more orders, he added.