Illegal constructions continue in City

LAHORE : Illegal constructions continued in the City right under the nose of the officers of the Lahore Development Authority (LDA), who allegedly provided all kind of ‘facilitation’ for such constructions.

A recent case which, came to light, was of an illegal construction/extension by a big/renowned grocery store situated on the main boulevard Allama Iqbal Town.

The superstore was constructing a pillar column structure on its back plot, which in official terminology was termed an illegal extension, a senior LDA official on anonymity said.

He added that this was a common practice that big buildings / plazas used to purchase backside properties of their buildings and extend their commercial premises.

In this recent case, a double-story pillar construction was constructed on the backside of a big grocery store. As per LDA’s policy, commercial pillar construction was allowed in any residential locality, and in the said case the area was completely residential.

Sources also said that someone from LDA’s union was behind this construction and was pressuring the officers concerned to ignore this issue.

Sources in LDA claimed that a number of similar buildings can be found in different areas of the City’s main commercial hubs where big buildings made illegal extensions with the ‘technical advice’ of the LDA’s ‘facilitators’.

Sources claimed that first of all the LDA officials concerned closed their eyes when the construction of such buildings started.

In case of a complaint to the higher-ups, an eye-washed operation was conducted and the illegal structure was demolished in a way that it caused minimum loss to the building.

In the second step, the building owner was told to cover up the construction area with a big wall or green wrap so no one can see what was going on inside the covered place, sources said, adding in the third phase a stay order was brought and finally an FIR was launched against the building contractor to settle down the issue on the papers.

In said case, the scribe first informed Director Town Planning Naveed Bhatti and he said that he would respond after inquiring into the matter.

However, he didn’t reply. Later, the scribe contacted Chief Town Planner Sidra Tabasum who said that she would inquire into the matter and would take strict action within this week.

She said that the building was sealed and directed Naveed Bhatti to demolish the illegal structure.