ISLAMABAD, Pakistan: Pakistan Railways 4,196.79 acres land is either encroached by private individuals or illegally possessed by the government and defence department throughout the country.
“As many as 2158.697 acres land has been encroached in Punjab, 250.914 acres in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 1167.711 acres in Sindh and 619.468 acres in Balochistan,” official sources told the state-run news agency while giving province-wise breakup of the encroached land.
They said that Pakistan Railways has retrieved and regularized 3,573 acres land by conducting anti encroachment operation which is still continuing against encroachers.
The ministry has taken steps to retrieve the encroached land and carried out a detailed survey to identify railways illegally occupied land by individuals and government departments.
The campaign is being monitored by the Divisional Superintendents, Headquarter Office and at the level of Ministry of Railways, they added.
The sources said that a comprehensive policy has been drawn to prevent further encroachments. This policy makes the concerned Pakistan Railway officers and Railway Policy officials jointly responsible in case of any new encroachment.
They said that Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) and joint Procedure orders have since been issued for strict implementation of this policy.
FIRs are being lodged and cases are registered and sent to Railway judicial Magistrates for expeditious trial, the sources added.
They said during the current campaign 1660 cases were registered and 1767 accused were arrested during the anti-encroachment operations.
The accused involved in 1179 cases were convicted whereas 35 were acquitted. 61 cases are under investigation.
The issue regarding illegal occupation of Railway land by government departments has also been taken up with concerned departments.
They said a project for computerization of railway land record was initiated during April 2015 with the assistance of Urban Unit in order to harmonize the railway land record with the record of all the provincial revenue departments.
This project is near completion and will ensure safeguard of railway land through a computerized monitoring system and will render total transparency in land management, they added.
