Shaheed Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto Sasti Basti Scheme (SMBBSBS), a project of the Sindh Katchi Abadis Authority (SKAA) launched to resettle 0.5 million families who are living in post 1985 katchi abadis, has given land grabbers the opportunity to occupy the government land.
On the directives of President Asif Ali Zardari, the Sindh government started 201 schemes in all 23 district of the province for providing 80 square yards plots to the relocated families, but the government has left the project midway for politically backed land grabbers to exploit the national assets, official sources told Business Recorder on Tuesday.
They said the purpose of the project was to stop further expansion of existing katchi abadis. "The provincial government has started pilot projects in various district headquarters, but left these ongoing projects midway," they added.
They said the authority has deputed surveyors at the proposed piece of land to prepare a map for the construction of low cost housing schemes for crises-hit masses, but after completion of the initial arrangements the government could not launch the project. Taking the advantage of the situation, land mafia came into action and started occupying the lands, sources maintained.
The authority has started 100 schemes in the provincial capital Karachi, 30 in Hyderabad, five in Jamshoro, five in Tando Muhammad Khan, one in Matiari, one in Tando Allahyar, five in Badin, five in Thatta, five in Dadu, 10 in Mirpurkhas, five in Sanghar, one in Umerkot, one in Tharparkar, five in Sukkur, two in Ghotki, four in Khairpur, five in Nawabshah, five in Naushero Feroze, three in Larkana, two schemes in Shikarpur and one in Kamber, Shahdadkot, Jacobabad and Kashmore.
They said the authority has sent law enforcers to vacate the occupied government lands from the encroachers and to arrest the culprits involved in these practices, however, the law enforcers neither vacated the land nor arrested them due to political pressure. "Recently, the powerful mafia has occupied government land at Maripur, which was surveyed for SMBBSBS and despite repeated attempts the law enforcers have failed to vacate the project land," the sources said.