JI demands alternative accommodation for Orangi Nullah residents

Jamaat-e-Islami Karachi emir Hafiz Naeem-ur-Rehman has said that the residents affected by the ongoing Orangi Nullah anti-encroachment operation should be given a house for house and a shop for shop under the Karachi Transformation Plan.

“Verbal deposits alone will not work. If there is any illegal occupation, then the occupiers should be punished. The government and the concerned agencies want to leave the illegal occupation of influential people and make the poor homeless,” he said while addressing a protest camp of Orangi Nullah residents.

Maulana Mudassar Hussain Ansari, emir of District West, Khalid Zaman Sheikh, deputy emir of the district, Master Aminullah Khan and others also addressed the protest camp.

“The government is responsible for maintaining law and order, electricity and gas, housing, but it has failed to fulfil its responsibility,” Rehman said and added: “Under which law can other top officials, including the DC, cancel the lease of houses? If the issues are not resolved through talks, the Jamaat-e-Islami will launch a full-scale protest movement along with the victims. The demolition of houses at any cost will not be allowed before the written announcement of giving houses in exchange for houses.”

The JI leader said that institutional planning for accuracy and repair should be brought before the residents. He said even after the payment of taxes and utility bills, the Orangi Nullah victims were being treated like stepmothers. He said residents living there had property rights, registries and NOCs.

“In case of action, thousands of people will take to the streets. Orangi Town has a lower middle class population. If the residents of Orangi Nullah are evicted, thousands of people will become homeless.” He said former city nazim Naimatullah Khan had provided alternative accommodation to 16,000 victims of the Lyari Expressway, and the Jamaat-e-Islami had already solved the problems of citizens and was still capable of doing so.

Affected residents, including women and children, chanted slogans against the Sindh government and the district administration and expressed their grief and anger. They also carried banners and placards in support of their demands. “We have lived here since 1975. At that time no map was prepared and now a new law has been drawn up. No houses should be demolished without alternative arrangements. Preparations to demolish about 1,700 houses are regrettable and reprehensible as most of the houses are leased.”

Mudassir Hussain Ansari said the Jamaat-e-Islami would not allow oppression on the victims, and would support them till the issues were resolved.

The Jamaat-e-Islami has filed a petition in the Sindh High Court through Usman Farooq Advocate with the lease papers of the residents. The JI will soon compile a list of victims and give them their rights.