Railways Asks Provincial Govts To Hand Over Its Land

ISLAMABAD, Mar 1 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 1st Mar, 2023 ) :The Ministry of Railways has asked the provincial governments to hand over its commercial, residential, and agricultural land to help to boost revenue of the department.

"In this regard, the Ministry of Railways had already written a letter to provincial governments urging them to give possession of the land as it was the property of the Railways," an official in the Ministry told APP.

Pakistan Railways' major portion of around 9,986 acres of land worth billion of rupees were found under illegal occupation of private, individual and different government departments across the country, he added.

The official said that as many as 3,287 acres land were occupied in Punjab, 832 acres under encroachment in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 5,180 acres in Sindh, and 687 acres of land were occupied in Balochistan.

However, he said Pakistan Railways had retrieved as many as 986 acres of its land worth million of rupees during various anti-encroachment operations across the country from the land grabbers.

"Around 484 acres retrieved in Punjab, 141 acres in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 335 acres in Sindh and only 26 acres in Balochistan," he added.

He said about 3,287 acres in Punjab, 832 acres in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 5,180 acres in Sindh, and 687 acres of land in Balochistan had been encroached by various parties.

The official said Pakistan Railways had also decided to accelerate its ongoing anti-encroachment operation against land grabbers across the country to recoup its land from different individuals, groups, and even business organizations that were using it for residential, commercial, and agricultural purposes for decades.

"The encroachment operation will be launched with the assistance of Railway Police and district administrations of the relevant provincial governments," he added.

He said the government was taking several steps to retrieve encroached land from the land grabbers, including a detailed survey being carried out to identify the encroached land, occupied by the individuals and under illegal occupation by various government departments.

The official said Pakistan Railways owned 167,690 acres of land across the country, of which 90,326-acre was in Punjab, 39,428-acre in Sindh, 28,228-acre in Balochistan, and 9,708-acre in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.