Rawalpindi: Commissioner Captain (retd) Mohammad Mehmood on Saturday assigned a one-week timeframe to the Rawalpindi Development Authority (RDA) for completing its land acquisition survey for the Nullah Leh Expressway project, according to news sources.
The city’s commissioner, while reviewing progress, said that the project aims to create an alternate route for commuters of the twin city, and to help avoid Rawalpindi from floods. He iterated that the RDA ought to collaborate with the land and revenue department, military lands and other civic bodies to finalise its reports with exact measurements of public and private-owned lands to launch the process of land acquisition.
The project’s review meeting was informed that the authority has a rough land estimation, which will be tabled before the next meeting. Previously, the RDA had acquired land along Nullah Leh for its widening after the flood of 2001, however, the land was encroached upon way before the project’s initiation.
Mehmood said that for the project to be launched on a private-public partnership basis, the investors should be given some land for the development of shopping malls or parking plazas along the route – so as to enabling them to obtain profits from their investment. He revealed that the expressway and flood channel will be 16 kilometres long. He further highlighted that the government used to spend PKR 40-50 million per annum for desilting the nullah before the monsoon season, but these funds can be rediverted after the project’s construction.
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