GUJRAT: In a biggest ever anti-encroachment operation of the district, the administration has demolished up to 16-foot long encroachments in front of at least 170 shops in Dinga town during the last couple of days.

The operation was launched on Friday following the visit of Gujranwala Commissioner Naveed Haider Sheerazi to the town where Gujrat Deputy Commissioner Safdar Virk briefed him on the issue.

Additional Deputy Commissioner Revenue Khizer Hayat Bhatti, who heads the anti-encroachment team in Dinga, said the operation had been launched to restore the 88 feet wide right of way in the main bazaar from Milad Chowk to Gulzar Shaheen Chowk where the shopkeepers had illegally encroached upon 25 to 35 foot road, squeezing the pathway.

Prior to the operation, the officials said the shop owners had been taken into confidence and they agreed to get their structures erased that were illegally constructed during the last 50 years.

It is learnt that the traders had earlier voluntarily removed their merchandise to pave the way for removal of the structures.

The administration is using heavy machinery in the operation that’s still going on in Dinga.

The DC also visited the Dinga town along with Kharian Assistant Commissioner Sher Ali Gondal on Saturday to review the operation.

He told the traders that an indiscriminate anti-encroachment operation would continue across the district to restore the roads, streets and commercial markets to their original shame as per the government record.

Meanwhile, the Gujrat Municipal Corporation also launched an operation in the city’s oldest Muslim Bazaar on Friday night during which encroachments in front of shops were removed.

Police booked Gujrat Anjuman Tajran President Javed Butt and several unidentified people on charge of resisting the anti-encroachment drive in the Muslim Bazaar. Butt had lied down in front of the heavy machinery to stop the officials from carrying out the operation.

The case was lodged with City’s B-Division police on the report of Ijaz Ahmed Butt, the enforcement inspector of Gujrat MC.

Speaking at the news conference, Mr Butt and other traders condemned the registration of a case against the traders, claiming that the traders had been cooperating with the administration and had removed the structures on their own.

Published in Dawn, February 17th, 2025