ISLAMABAD: The city managers are looking towards the new government for getting approval of new names for reconstitution of the commission to carry out the much-delayed revision of Islamabad’s master plan.

The revision of the master plan has been facing a delay for decades. Almost every government made an announcement to carry out the revision only to shelve the project.

In the latest development, the caretaker government had showed its interest in approving names as members to reconstitute the already notified commission, which had become inactive a couple of years ago. CDA had moved a summary to the interior ministry last month for placing it before the caretaker government. However, sources said that the summary could not be placed before the cabinet for approval.

“The summary we moved last month could not be taken up by the outgoing interim cabinet. Now we are looking towards the Shehbaz Sharif-led government to get it approved,” said an official of CDA.

Summary seeking approval for new members could not be taken up by caretaker cabinet, says official

He said that if the new government approved the summary and passed a direction for revision of the master plan, the work could be started.

Another official of CDA said: “We are expecting that after finalising cabinet members, the new government will approve the summary on priority basis.”

Last month, the CDA had forwarded a list of 20 experts to the federal cabinet out of which the cabinet was supposed to approve 13 names. In addition, there will be seven ex-officio members.

The federal capital, which was built in accordance with a well-documented master plan developed in 1960, has been constantly facing changes to its master plan without any input from professional consultants.

The master plan has seen around 45 changes by successive governments, but a proper revision has not been made yet.

Doxiadis Associates, a Greece-based firm that prepared the master plan, had recommended its revision after every 20 years. However, no such revision has been made that resulted into poor planning and mushroom growth of unauthorised construction.

The issue of revision of the master plan was also taken up by former caretaker prime minister Anwaarul Haq Kakar during a cabinet meeting. He had directed the CDA to propose new names for the commission.

The Kakar-led caretaker cabinet had directed for inclusion of urban planners and other professionals having national and international expertise in the commission. Accordingly, sources said, CDA officials had proposed the new names of professional experts.

In the summary, the CDA had proposed seven names of urban planners out of whom the cabinet would finalise five names.

The seven experts were Dr Shabihul Hassan Zaidi, Dr Imran Mohammad, Dr Abdul Waheed, Umar Farooq, Shoial Faridi, Mohammad Abdullah and Khurram Farid Bargat.

Meanwhile, the CDA proposed a panel of three experts for one post of transportation planning specialist. They are: Khushal Khan, Mian Wamiq Anwar and Azam Khan Lodhi.

Two names of architects - Prof Dr Noman Ahmad and Ejaz Ahmed Qadri - were proposed against one post. Names of former member engineering and planning CDA Hafiz Ehsanul Haq, Dr Pervez Ahsan Khan and Prof Dr Obaidullah Nadeem had been proposed against the posts of civil engineer, water resource and management expert and academicians, respectively.

Similarly, for one post of environmentalist, the names of Viqar Zikria and Dr Ghulam Raza Bhatti had been proposed along with urban economist Dr Naveed Iftikhar and senor lawyer Hafiz Arfaat Ahmad. The ex-officio members included the CDA chairman, who will act as the convener of the commission, and the member planning, chief physical planning and housing, Planning Commission of Pakistan, director general Rawalpindi Development Authority, director general Pakistan Environment Protection Agency, director general planning CDA and any other co-opted member to be nominated by civic agency’s member planning.

When the PTI government came to power in 2018, it announced that the master plan would be revised and the then prime minister Imran Khan also formed a commission. However, the commission, after a delay, prepared an interim report in 2020 which was mostly related to building by-laws and regularisation of certain areas, including Banigala.

But the commission left proper revision of the master plan to a professional firm which due to various reasons could not be hired till Mr Khan’s government was removed.

Later, the commission became inactive, therefore, it was decided that a new commission would be formed and a summary was sent to the interior ministry in December 2022 for its reconstitution. But that could not be approved followed by another summary last month.

Published in Dawn, March 11th, 2024