LAHORE: The Ravi Urban Development Authority (Ruda) says that it has sufficient land to resume work on the first phase of the Ravi Riverfront Urban Development Project in the light of permission granted by the Supreme Court.

However, a counsel for farmers and affected persons said only 300 acres so far had been acquired.

On Monday, the Supreme Court suspended the Lahore High Court’s (LHC) decision to scrap the Ravi Riverfront Urban Development Project and permitted the government to resume construction work on the portion of land where the owners had been compensated.

On Jan 25, the LHC dealt a blow to the government’s plan by declaring several provisions of the Ruda Act of 2020 unconstitutional.

Petitioners refute official claim on land acquisition

Ruda spokesperson Sher Afzal Butt told Dawn that the government had purchased 5,000 acres through cash payment. “The owners of around 25,000 to 30,000 acre picked up forms to sell their land to the authority,” he said.

He said 15,000 to 16,000 acres were the state land already awarded to the authority and they would have to start the first phase of Sapphire Bay on it soon.

He said they would have to construct a 10 marla to one kanal villas in the residential project Chihar Bagh on 300 acres and would also build 12, 16 and 45 stories residential flats on it.

He said the residential flats and villas would be constructed in the Bootipura area and it would connect to the Ring Road.

He rejected the claims of the petitioners opposing the project for only purchasing 300 acres and said the petitioners were misleading the court and public.

Petitioner’s counsel Fahad Malik told Dawn that the Ruda authorities never presented any documentary evidence in LHC and Supreme Court proceedings ever about the purchased land.

He said the authorities only had claimed to acquire 95 percent of the land from the people and also claimed to have paid the compensation. “No document to substantiate the claim ever produced in the court,” he said.

He only the small farmers having one or two acres had sold their land to avoid problems in the future whereas those having more than 100 acres had not sold their land.

Mr Malik said it might be possible the state land would also be included in the project and he had information that there was the forest department and irrigation department land was also taken but he had never seen any document of the relevant departments submitted in the court.

He said the Ruda had only paid compensation to some farmers and had only acquired 300 acres and they were only allowed to start work on it.

He said the government had wanted to build the project like establishing Islamabad but was not following the same criteria to get land for the project.

He said the government also had submitted in the court that they had acquired 500 acres from the farmers who would later be given developed plots in terms of compensation.

Published in Dawn, February 1st, 2022