BAHAWALPUR: Around 1,000 CCTV cameras will be installed in and around the city soon, says Punjab Minister for Cooperatives Malik Muhammad Iqbal Channar.

Speaking to Dawn on Sunday, the minister said the installation of these CCTV cameras would be part of the measures being put in place under the Safe City Project which had been announced by the Punjab government some time back. He said these cameras would be installed at different locations such as city’s entry and exit points to ensure protection of the citizens and make the anti-militant campaign a success. Among other steps would be the creation of Doplhin Force.

Mr Channar said he was monitoring city’s progress and development and on his advice, the administration had successfully restored/rehabilitated the lost and vanished historic gates of the city and these would be shortly inaugurated. He said he had also proposed a new gate near Welcome Colony on Railway Road to commemorate the wedding ceremony of the late Nawab Bahawalpur Brig Muhammad Abbas Abbasi (father of Nawab Salahuddin Abbasi), who had been the Punjab governor during the PPP regime of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.

He said the proposal to construct a ring road was under consideration of the Punjab government. Once built, it would serve as an alternative to the city’s only Circular Road. He said the eight-kilometre project was estimated to cost Rs2.10 billion and at present Punjab’s Planning and Development (P&D) Wing was working for its approval. He said the matter to acquire some parts of the land for the construction of ring road falling within the jurisdiction of Cantonment limits had been sorted out.

As for allotment of free land to the people of Cholistan in the vast desert under the Punjab chief minister’s package, Mr Channar, who is chairman of the Cholistan Development Authority (CDA), made it clear that the government did not want to drag the issue up to the 2018 election. He said the appeals against the acceptance/rejection of some of the applications were being heard by appellant authorities. In Bahawalnagar and Rahim Yar Khan, special appellant district committees headed by the retired districts and sessions judge had completed the disposal of such appeals, while in Bahawalpur these appeals were still being heard. After the process, he said, the next phase of allotments to the landless people of Cholistan would be started.

RESCUE 1122: Senator Saood Majid Chaudhry and member Public Affairs Committee for South Punjab Development on Sunday laid the foundation stone for the construction of the Rescue 1122 station in Yazman.

The senator said the establishment of the emergency service station was a long-standing demand of the people of Yazman.

Published in Dawn, May 22nd, 2017