Lahore: CHIEF Justice Khawaja Muhammad Sharif of the Lahore High Court (LHC) while disposing of writ petitions has directed the Ravi Town Administration to remove encroachments from Pakistan Cloth Market.
The chief justice on Tuesday also gave time to shop owners to remove debris by Eid ul Fitr. The petition was filed by Muhammad Sadiq, a resident of a locality adjoining to the Pakistan Cloth Market seeking easy access to the main road coming from Delhi Gate.
The petitioner submitted that the access of the residents to the main road was restricted due to illegal encroachment by construction of a wall along with the seven shops, some ‘khokhas’ and electricity transformers.
Earlier, a report filed by a law officer and the DCO also confirmed that there were illegal and unauthorized constructions of shops against the sanctioned plan. As many as 36 shops in the centre of the market had been built, the report said, adding 11 more shops had been built along with the street on the eastern side of the market.
The CJ observed that these two sets of shops had not become the dispute between the residents of the area and the committee, therefore, he left their demolition at the discretion of Ravi Town TMA and the committee.
However, the owners of seven shops were given time to remove their shops by Eid ul Fitr and if they failed to do so, the shops will be demolished, CJ observed.
Wapda authorities were also directed to install the transformers at proper places so as to avoid inconvenience to the residents of the locality.
The chief justice also directed the SSP (Operations) to give full support to the officials of Ravi Town.
The TMO Ravi Town was directed to give compliance report to Additional Registrar (Judicial) of the high court.
