Category Archives: Land Grabbing

‘TILL THE FARMER GETS HIS LAND, POVERTY WILL NOT END’

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 Haneen Rafi

Dawn, July 24, 2017

KARACHI: “The rights of the peasant will benefit greatly only by creating widespread social awareness of land reforms which can be our greatest weapon. And this cannot be possible without including women in this struggle,” said PPP Senator Taj Haider at a seminar organised by the Awami Workers Party in Karachi on Sunday.

Highlighting the importance of empowering the farmer and peasant, Mr Haider criticised the fact that Pakistan remained one of the few countries that allowed a system to persist in which a few individuals sitting at home directly benefitted from the farmer toiling away on the fields.

The urgency of the land reforms needed in Pakistan have remained a constant demand of the AWP in a bid to battle the monopoly of feudal land owners that have for long usurped the rights of the peasants.

AWP peasant secretary Hassan Askari highlighted how land reforms in East Pakistan were more rigorously pushed through than in West Pakistan. “In East Pakistan land reforms were supported more because most of the land owners there were Hindus. In West Pakistan the land owners however, were not touched.”

“One of the most dynamic revolutionary forces is the kisan,” said AWP Sindh president Bakhshal Thallo, who explained how it was the British who organised and privatised the feudal system in South Asia.

Central secretary general Akhtar Hussain was of the opinion that to make land reforms, or for that matter any sort of reforms successful, the grassroots need to be galvanised and be invested enough to get the reforms implemented. If this is missing, then no amount of reforms will garner much change as there are many examples in Pakistan.

He also spoke about different legal developments the country has witnessed with regards to land reforms.

Prof Tauseef Ahmed Khan criticised how giving ownership of the land to the peasant was not a custom accepted by those in power. “It was for the first time after the revolution in 1917 in the Soviet Union that a state accepted that the land belongs to the peasant and eliminated the feudal system.”

He explained that it was when the communist party was established in the subcontinent that the idea that the peasant who works on a piece of land should own it too came to the fore. However, in his opinion the political parties led down this cause. Even in Pakistan this trend subsisted. “It was the Left politics that created a sense of awareness among the kisan about his rights. And till the farmer does not get his land, poverty will never end from this country.”

https://www.dawn.com/news/1347188/till-the-farmer-gets-his-land-poverty-will-not-end

PKMT demands pro-farmers policies

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Press Release:

July 16, 2017

The Pakistan Kissan Mazdoor Tehreek (PKMT) Khyberpakhun Khua chapter holds its 5th provincial assembly on July 16, 2017 in Bagh Darai, lower dir.  All of the PKMT members for KPK province participated in large numbers.

Altaf Hussain, PKMT National Coordinator spoke on water issues and market rate for the grower. He stress that due to the climate change there are less rain or more rains hence most of the rainfed land had is being distorting. The government is also not interested in solving the issue since there is no electrify for tube wells. In these critical circumstances whatever production that farmer got could not get good rate in the market. The Globalization and WTO policies implemented in such a way in the country that imported grains i.e. potatoes, onion among others are so cheap. He demand that climate justice, that mean those who responsible for the climate issues for example US, EU and other 1st world nations should pay compensation to the third world loss and they should also change their industrial production system in which high carbon emission is being discharged.

Fayyaz Ahmed, Provincial Coordinator, PKMT pointed out that 70.8 percent of households in Sindh were already suffering from malnutrition and poverty from the oppressive exploitative feudal land lords in the province, and to push profit-oriented corporate land grab and real estate development projects in the province would intensify hunger and poverty in the province. He also told that women agriculture workers should also been recognized as labour.

Asif Khan, member PKMT from Haripur mentioned that commodification of the natural resources which include land, water, seed, and forest etc. for corporate interest bring the mother earth at high risk. Deforestation, land erosion, food contamination, glacier melting are happening at a very high speed. Flood, drought, diseases are the manifestation of these issues. If people owns and control these very natural resources peoples’ life would be at ease, happy healthy, and prosperous like in case of a village in Gilgit “Goharabad” where they own and control their mountain, tress, fruits etc.

PKMT leaders Raja Mujeeb, Tariq Mehmood and Wali Haider told that government is pursuing policies that advocate the production of genetically-engineered cotton; a policy which would ultimately allow hegemonic transnational seed companies such as Monsanto to take control and dictate the total agricultural cotton policy and production in the province, which surely will also spread to other provinces. The Amended Seed Act, 2015 and Plant Breeders Rights Act has already been passed which will aggressively promote hybrid and GM cotton; the next step would be they promotion of GM maize, as maize is the most important crop for KPK, the farmers of KPK should be aware of the implications and must resist. All of these initiatives are there to protect intellectual property rights of the TNCs in result BT cotton and Maize business will have a legal cover.

PKMT firmly reasserts farmers collective right to seed, its free exchange among farmers; it is the farmers who have bred, preserved and passed on the genetic material of seed over many millennia and we will not allow profit-hungry corporations to control the most basic agricultural input – critical for maintaining life on our planet. The agro-chemical mega-corporations that thrive on ‘selling’ lies about higher yields has gained super profits while leaving farmers reeling under multi-pronged crises from suicidal debt, to ever-increasing cost of production, pests and super bugs infestation, falling yields, and destroyed lands and lives. BT-cotton cultivation is a diabolical attack that will replace/reduce wheat production, the most critical food crop that ensures food security of the small and landless farmers.

PKMT demands that instead of promoting TNCs interest and GM crops, the government must put a moratorium on GM technology so that national genetic resources, environment, biodiversity and most importantly right to seed for farmers can be protected.

Local and indigenous seed stalls and pictorial exhibition of PKMT 10 years struggle were also displayed in the Assembly.

Released by: Pakistan Kissan Mazdoor Tehreek (PKMT)

https://www.dawn.com/news/1345831/timergara-people-seek-clean-drinking-water

National Consultation on Land Rights: A Policy Discussion with Stakeholders

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Press Release

July 12, 2017

A national consultation was held on Land Rights: A policy Discussion with Stakeholders in Margala Hotel, Islamabad on 12th July, 2017 organized by Pakistan Kissan Mazdoor Tehreek (PKMT) and Roots for Equity.

The consultation was held in the context of Sustainable Development Goal 1 “ending poverty in all its forms everywhere” which specifies a target of “all men and women, in particular the poor and vulnerable, have equal rights to economic resources, . . . , ownership and control over land. . . .” In addition, Goal 2 aims to “End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture” by 2030, and also emphasizes equal access to land for small farmers. So, in essence, land rights is a core pillar for achieving a world without injustice, inequity, hunger, exploitation, and discrimination. No doubt, achieving universal human dignity is not possible without ensuring land rights of small and landless farmers, which comprise a majority of the world population.

Dr. Azra Talat Sayeed, Executive Director Roots for Equity contextualized the need for the consultation, and detailed the basic three fundamental structural causes that have led to increased landlessness: these included feudal control over land, globalization and neoliberal policies in agriculture with emphasis on corporate agriculture, agro fuel production, and immense increase in land grab due to mega development projects; and third climate crisis. She emphasized that lack of equitable distribution of has resulted in immense hunger and poverty among the farming communities especially for women and children. Way forward was based on genuine democracy with the basic foundation of accountability to the people.

Community leaders, Kabir Khan highlighted that Rakh Azmat Wala in District Rajanpur farmers are facing a dire situation as the government has evacuated farming communities that have tilled this land for more than a hundred years; in addition many farmers have been charged with various crimes and given more than one FIR. He demanded that the government should give the ownership of these land to the farmers instead of handing over the land to Chinese investors. Raja Mujaeeb another farmer leader from Ghotki, SIndh stressed that a very huge percentage of rural communities are landless and few individuals hold vast tracts of land which creates huge inequities in society. He demanded there should be just and equitable land distribution in the country. Riverine community youth leader Saleem elaborated that climate disasters, especially floods create constant havoc in riverine communities. He demanded that farmers in this area should be given permanent land so that they can access decent lives. Rubina Saigol said that women farmers must be given land based on equitable distribution. In addition, agricultural workers, especially women must be recognized as formal agricultural workers, and farmers. Various public representatives at the consultation provided their input. According to MPA Syed Aleem Shah, the government is acquiring land which is under state ownership, and it is the government’s legal right to take back the land for national interest. MPA Sardar Aurangaiz said in KPK government cannot agriculture land for industrial projects and housing schemes.  Ex MPA Syed Bedar Hussain Shah recommended that land should only be given to the farmers as well as social protection policies be developed for agricultural workers.

Major recommendations at the end of consultation were demanding equitable distribution of land among men and women farmers, and social protection to be provided for agricultural workers.

RELEASED BY: Pakistan Kissan Mazdoor Tehreek (PKMT) & Roots for Equity

MPS CRITICISE FEDERAL SHARIAT COURT FOR DERAILING LAND REFORMS

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Dawn, June 16th, 2017

Kalbe Ali

ISLAMABAD: The Federal Shariat Court (FSC) was criticised during a meeting of a Senate standing committee on Thursday for derailing land reforms in the country.

The committee urged provinces to support efforts for a new law in this regard.

The Senate Standing Committee on Information and Broadcasting met for a special hearing by senior lawyer Abid Hassan Manto regarding his case in the Supreme Court for initiating land reforms in the country.

He told the committee that land reforms were derailed after a decision by the Federal Shariat Court in a case popularly known as the Kazalbash Trust Case in 1989, in which it was decided that land reforms were un-Islamic.

PPP Senator Taj Haider said he was in favour of land reforms in the country and said Justice Taqi Usman had even ruled that the breaking up of large land holdings was also un-Islamic.

Mr Manto said he had gone to the apex court against the judgement by the Shariat Court but the SC was not taking up the case.

“Former chief justice Iftikhar Chaudhry even asked me where my clients who wanted land reforms were, as those opposing the reforms were also there,” he said.

He requested the Senate body to either become party in the SC case or formulate a law to initiate land reforms in the country.

Attorney General Ashtar Ausaf Ali said if the Senate becomes party in the SC case it would mean they are lowering their powers as lawmakers and are asking the same from the court, and suggested a new law for land reforms should be made.

The chairman of the committee, Senator Kamil Ali Agha said the Federal Shariat Court has left nothing to initiate land reforms.

The 1989 Shariat Court judgement says the government cannot take inherited or religious land and has to pay market price to buy land from private individuals. Committee members observed that the government cannot take land given by colonial rulers but can take land from individuals who bought it after independence.

“If the government has to buy land at market rate from landowners who do not even till it, then where will the reforms go,” Senator Agha asked.

Officials of the Federal Land Commission informed the committee that one of the reasons for the delays in land reforms was the continuous shifting of the commission from one ministry to the other and that it was currently part of heritage and therefore under the Ministry of Information, Broadcasting and National Heritage.

The committee was told that Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Punjab and Balochistan were opposed to laws regarding land reforms while Senator Haider said Sindh supported laws for land reforms.

Senator Karim Ahmed Khawaja said small land holdings will ensure high yield at low cost as families will concentrate on effective farming and stated that feudalism was the opponent of democracy.

The committee was informed that land reforms were initiated in 1959 which limited land holding to 500 acres for irrigated land and 1,000 acres of un-irrigated land and the land reforms of 1972 set these limits to 150 acres and 300 acres respectively.

The committee has asked the provinces to forward their point of view over land reforms under which large land holdings will be distributed among landless farmers and family members to ensure effective and technical farming.

https://www.dawn.com/news/1339857

The Day of the Landless March 29,2017

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Press Release:

The Pakistan Kissan Mazdoor Tehreek (PKMT) and Roots for Equity in collaboration with the Asian Peasant Coalition (APC), Pesticide Action Network (PAN AP) and other Asian organizations marked the Day of the Landless under the theme “Fight for Land! Fight for Life! Intensifying the Struggle against the Global Land Grabbing!” The Day of the Landless acknowledges and registers the struggles of farmers across the world that have been forcefully evicted from their land, even though they and their ancestors have lived on these lands for many generations. A number of countries including Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mongolia, Nepal, Philippines, and Sri Lanka held various events to mark the day.

Pakistan Kissan Mazdoor Tehreek and Roots for Equity lodged their protest on the Day of the Landless by holding a press conference at the Peshawar Press Club, Peshawar, and a protest in front of the Ghotki Press Club, Ghotki, Sindh.

Altaf Hussain, PKMT National Coordinator spoke against pro-investment policies that were being promoted to implement various development projects, and economic zones including the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) that were leading to increasing cases of land grab, including those happening in Hattar, Haripur. He pointed out that farmers, who were already facing hardship due to ongoing operations against fundamentalism, were further pushed toward loss of livelihood, hunger and impoverishment due to land grab made for the Northern Bypass, Peshawar and Hattar Economic Zone. PKMT’s Khyber Pakhtunkwa (KPK) Provincial Coordinator, Fayaz Ahmed, rejected the provincial government’s notification for acquiring 1,000 acres agricultural land in Hattar, Haripur. He pointed out that a previous land grab in 2008 by the provincial government of about 3400 canal (435 acres) of land – a highly exploitative measure – had also forced farmers to sell their land for which they received negligible compensation. Once more, in the name of development, farmers are being evicted from their land, which will lead to their deprivation, leading to not only increase in hunger and poverty in the province but also have negative impact on national agriculture economy and food security. Alftaf Hussain pointed out that land is farmers’ right, and now farmers will not allow themselves to be evicted from land – there is no doubt that the farmers from Hattar and surrounding areas totally reject the government’s notification for further land acquisition.

PKMT National Coordinator Altaf Hussain along with Provincial Coordinator Fayaz Ahmed during a Press Conference on Day of the Landless

PKMT also lead a protest in Ghotki, Sindh, against farmers being evicted from land. The PKMT Sindh Provincial Coordinator, Ali Nawaz Jalbani spoke against the eviction of farmers from Ghotki Seed Farm, Omer Dhoko Farm, and Ruk Farm. addition, Jalbani pointed that farmers have also been evicted from 1,872 acres of Cotton Research Farm where farmers had been living for many decades and regularly paid the government the stipulated share of production. He pointed out that instead of using an adjoining vast area of non-agricultural land, farmers are being evicted for developing residential areas on very fertile agricultural land. Ali Gohar, Ghotki Coordinator, PKMT pointed out that 70.8 percent of households in Sindh were already suffering from malnutrition and poverty from the oppressive exploitative feudal land lords in the province, and to push profit-oriented real estate development projects in the province would intensify hunger and poverty in the province.

Neoliberal policies across the country were the reason for evicting small and landless farmers so that grabbed land would be given to investors and foreign corporations. The profit driven agenda to develop free economic zones, highways and various infrastructure projects will intensify hunger and poverty in the country. PKMT demands that all land grab policies must be stopped immediately; instead equitable land distribution must be carried out among women and men farmers that will be the basis for eradicating not only hunger and poverty but also lead to food sovereignty.

Food Sovereignty our Right!

Released by: Pakistan Kissan Mazdoor Tehreek (PKMT)

Urdu Press Release:

The Day of the Landless March 29

Okara farms dispute nearing ‘amicable solution’

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Dawn February 14th, 2017

IKRAM JUNAIDI

ISLAMABAD: The military and the tenants of the Okara Military Farms have reached an agreement, which could lead to an amicable solution of the long-standing dispute, the Okara district administration has told the National Commission on Human Rights (NCHR).

In a report, recently submitted to NCHR, the district administration has claimed that a new agreement has been reached between the two sides, whereby tenant farmers will give the army a share from their crop, rather than making lump sum cash payments.

Under the terms of this new agreement, the mazareen will remain tenants on the land, while a committee would be established to settle any other disputes.

The Okara Military Farms were developed under the British Raj. The land was owned by the British army and after 1947 it automatically stood transferred to the Pakistan Army. For decades, the army used to get share from the produce of the farms, but under the rule of retired Gen Pervez Musharraf, a contract system was introduced and farmers were made to pay rent in cash. It was also decided that the military could ask tenants to vacate the land at any time.

Consequently, the farmers established an Anjuman-i-Mazareen to protect their rights, while the military began demanding that the land be vacated. This led to protests against the military, while cases of terrorism, extortion and theft were frequently registered against those who allegedly refused to vacate the land.

In April 2016, the Anjuman-i-Mazareen held a protest in the federal capital, which received extraordinary coverage with prominent politicians visiting the protest. The issue was also taken up in the Senate, while Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) chairperson Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari also met representatives of the tenants at Zardari House in Islamabad.

Human Rights Commissioner Chaudhry Mohammad Shafique told Dawn that NCHR took suo motu of the issue notice in May 2016.

“Three members, including myself, visited Okara and after getting all the information, we submitted a report to the Senate and shared it with the federal and provincial governments. We also said that the issue could be addressed amicably,” he said.

“A broader agreement has been made, in which it has been decided that the tenants will pay the batai (share) from their crops instead of cash and in return they will not be displaced from the land. Moreover a committee, which will have the representation of the military, the district administration and the tenants, has been established to settle any other disputes,” he said.

When asked when he expected the issue would be resolved, Mr Shafique said he was hopeful that the matter would be settled by March this year.

According to an official statement, a three-member NCHR bench, headed by retired Justice Ali Nawaz Chohan and consisting of Chaudhry Shafique and minorities member Ishaq Masih Naz, held the hearings.

NCHR constituted a fact-finding committee, which visited the Okara farms and submitted a detailed report.

“In the hearing, the Okara deputy commissioner presented a written report that a peace agreement between military farms management and representatives of the protesting farmers has been made. The said agreement has been signed by the commandant Military Farms Group Okara and the representatives of the tenants. It was witnessed by the district administration and police,” the statement said.

https://www.dawn.com/news/1314706

‘60PC KHAIRPUR SEZ PLOTS SOLD TO CHINESE’

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Dawn, December 14th, 2016

Parvaiz Ishfaq Rana

KARACHI: Sixty per cent of industrial plots at the Khairpur Special Economic Zone (SEZ), now said to be a part of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), have been sold to Chinese investors, Provincial Minister for Industries and Commerce Manzoor Hussain Wassan disclosed on Tuesday.

Speaking at a meeting organised by the Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI), the minister said the special industrial zones in Larkana and Mohanjedaro are expected to be inaugurated in January 2017. The two zones, spread over 500 acres, have also been linked to the CPEC, he added.

Similarly, Dhabejee, Karachi Circular Railways, Zulfikarabad Industrial Estate and Marble City have become part of the CPEC, he added.

He acknowledged that some industrial zones in interior Sindh collapsed. He proposed to set up a committee to monitor the rehabilitation of five industrial areas of the city.

The minister said the Sindh government was ready to cooperate with business community to promote industrialisation.

Referring to his recent visit to Korangi Industrial Area, he said he pressed Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah to use funds one billion rupees allocated for the purpose.

He sought FPCCI’s help in completing documents to access the said amount for the uplift of industrial areas before June 2017.

He further said the Sindh government has already allocated funds in its Annual Development Plan (ADP) for the SITE Superhighway and assured that all encroachments along the route would be removed.

The provincial minister went on to warn the business community to bring back funds parked in Middle East banks, stressing that there was a danger of accounts getting blocked.

The emerging conditions in US and Europe for Muslims might prompt Pakistanis to return to Karachi that offers many opportunities, Mr Wassan claimed.

https://www.dawn.com/news/1302172/60pc-khairpur-sez-plots-sold-to-chinese

SAVE OUR HOMES! PROTESTERS DECRY LOSS OF LIVELIHOOD DUE TO DAM CONSTRUCTION

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The Express Tribune, November 8th, 2016.

KARACHI: The Sindh government and Sindh Engro Coal Mining Company’s (SECMC) plan to construct a dam on agricultural land drove residents of Ghorani village in Islamkot Tehsil to tears on Monday.

Protesters such as Sita Bai pleaded to the government not to take away their livelihoods during a demonstration outside the Karachi Press Club. She said that she and her fellow villagers had been on the road, fighting for their rights for 17 consecutive days.

Leela Ram and Ravi Shankar, who have been leading the protest in Islamkot and Karachi, told The Express Tribune, “We don’t have any political agenda, rather it’s a question of our children and that our coming generations are going to be affected by this toxic water dam.”

Ram explained that the toxic water from the Thar coalfields will be amassed in the dam being built by the government on private and cultivable landholdings rather than on deserted ones in the same area.

The resident alleged that the proposed 2,700-acre dam will harm their pattern of living and damage the local ecosystem of the area.

According to other protesters, who were shouting slogans, the toxic water dam being constructed in Thar Block-II by SECMC is a grave injustice to the people of the area.

Fifteen villages with a population of 15,000 people will be affected by the construction of the dam, as the area of some of the villages will be submerged once the dam is constructed while others will have to deal with seepage, claimed the villagers. Agricultural land and around 20,000 livestock will also suffer.

They asserted that unlike most villages in Tharparkar desert, theirs is rich, with about 200,000 trees, 20 potable water wells, natural ponds and five historical graveyards – all of which will be affected by the dam.

Junaid Kumar said that their elected representatives do not care about their plight or their future. “This is the first time we celebrated Diwali while protesting on the road,” he lamented.

Another protester, Lakho Bheel, said they do not want to halt construction of the damn but they are demanding the authorities change the location of the dam to an area where there is no cultivatable land or population.

“We are patriotic and must not be considered to be against the development of our area by coal exploration,” maintained Shankar. He added that his people were certainly not against the prosperity of the area.

He demanded the Chief Justice of Pakistan, the chief minister of Sindh and the chairperson of Pakistan Peoples Party to take notice of the dam. Otherwise, he warned, they will continue to protest indefinitely.

The SECMC, a joint venture of the Sindh government and Engro Powergen Limited, plans to produce 3,960 megawatts (MW) of electricity through four 330MW and four 660MW plants.

http://tribune.com.pk/story/1223702/save-homes-protesters-decry-loss-livelihood-due-dam-construction/

Footprints: A case of mistaken identities?

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NASIR JAMAL

A CHAK 28/2R resident, Ghulam Murtaza, points towards the place where the ‘shootout’ took place

A CHAK 28/2R resident, Ghulam Murtaza, points towards the place where the ‘shootout’ took place – Photo by writer

OKARA: In the midst of lush green fields in Chak 28/2R — one of the several villages that make up Okara’s Kulyana Military Estate — sits a decrepit cemented structure, the outhouse where the Okara police claim the six terrorists they had killed during a ‘shootout’ in the early hours of July 13 were hiding.

Many villagers speaking to Dawn recall how they were woken up by speeding police trucks and jeeps late in the night. None dared to step out, and only learnt about the “raid and gunfight” the next morning, after the bodies of the suspects had already been removed.

“It was in the dead of the night when we heard police vehicles racing in the direction of the outhouse,” says Dilshad Ali, a village resident.

The outhouse belongs to a retired army major, Faqir Hussain, who, like other military officers, was allotted land in the Kulyana Estate around 20 years ago. But it has been in possession of two Anjuman Muzaraeen Punjab (AMP) leaders — Saleem Jhakkar, who has been in jail for the last year and a half, and his brother Naeem.

It was in 2009 when the retired major’s men allegedly shot dead three protesting tenants over a land rent dispute, after which Faqir Hussain has never been able to return to the village. “The tenants, led by Saleem, grabbed all my land eight years ago. I tried every available option but neither the military nor the provincial government helped me regain possession of the land I made cultivable after almost 10 years of hard work. The police are on the side of the tenants, and the courts haven’t helped either,” he says.

According to police claims, Naeem had given shelter to the suspects at the outhouse. “He fled the place after the raid and is now a fugitive,” says a senior Okara police official. Some say the government has announced a reward of up to Rs1 million for information that may lead to his arrest.

AMP activist Ghulam Murtaza says no one has any knowledge of the whereabouts of the families of the AMP leaders. “Only the police can tell whether they are hiding or are in their custody,” he says.

There are more than 50 policemen lounging in the AMP leader’s home; their officer-in-charge seems unhappy to see a newspaper team asking his men about the whereabouts of the family of the owner. “We were brought here the morning after the encounter with terrorists and don’t know anything,” he says. “Talk to our seniors if you want any details; we cannot help you.”

Murtaza, like other villagers, rules out even the “remotest possibility of the presence of suspects at the outhouse before the police arrived,” insisting that neither any AMP leader nor the tenants have anything to do with religious militants.

“It is a lame effort to start a witch-hunt against Naeem and the rest of the AMP leadership [in Okara] to break the back of our movement for land rights, and evict us from the land we have been tilling for more than four generations. We are not terrorists. Nor are our leaders, as the police would want the world to believe,” he says.

There is hardly any evidence at the outhouse to corroborate the police’s claim that a fierce gunfight between security forces and suspected terrorists took place there less than a week ago. There are a few large bloodstains on the ground of the verandah, and on the bedcloth inside the room; no bullet marks can be seen on the outer walls. The room has been stripped down and appears to have been out of use for quite some time.

A news agency report has quoted the management of Lal Masjid that two of the six suspects killed in the encounter were employees of Jamia Hafsa and had been in custody of security forces for several months. This development has lent further credence to the villagers’ claim that the shootout was no more than a case of “custody killings”.

Police, however, say intelligence was provided by the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). “The raid was carried out jointly by the counter-terrorism department, local police, and ISI officials,” says a senior police official, unwilling to be identified.

A leader of the Awami Workers’ Party (AWP), Farooq Tariq, who has been working with tenants of the Okara military farms for their land rights since the movement began 15 years ago, also says the incident was “staged” and is an attempt by the military farm administration, with the aid of the police, to force tenants to strike a deal with the Kulyana Estate allottees on their conditions.

A few days after the Kulyana Estate village ‘operation’, police and military personnel raided the house of Mehr Abdul Sattar in Chak 4/4L. Sattar has been in jail since April when he tried to organise a peasant convention. “Police had not found anything in Sattar’s home when they raided it to arrest him. But after the so-called Kulyana shootout, they claim to have recovered weapons and Indian currency. Doesn’t their story baffle you?” says the AWP leader.

“If the authorities think they can scare tenants by labelling their leaders as Indian agents, or framing them in false cases by using high-handed tactics, they are grossly mistaken.”

Published in Dawn, July 26th, 2016

http://www.dawn.com/news/1273244/footprints-a-case-of-mistaken-identities

FARMERS PROTEST LAND ACQUISITION FOR INDUSTRIAL ESTATE

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Dawn, July 21st, 2016

GUJRAT: Scores of farmers and landowners from different villages along the Gujrat-Sargodha road on Wednesday staged a demonstration in front of the district government complex against a proposal to acquire land for the establishment of phase II of the industrial estate area.

At least 480 acres of agricultural land between Saroki and Sheikh Sukha along Sargodha Road have been earmarked by the local land revenue department and approved by stakeholders, including the Punjab Small Industries Estate Department and local business community.

A large number of people from Jhandewal, Mund, Dhudra and Sheikh Sukha — the villages to be affected due to the proposed land acquisition — gathered at the district government and staged a demonstration.

The protesters demanded the authorities select another site since the proposed site comprised rich fertile land, which should be spared for agricultural purposes only.

Later, representatives of the protesters met with District Coordination Officer (DCO) Liaquat Ali Chattha and local PML-N MPA Haji Imran Zafar to convey apprehensions of the villagers over the project.

They asked the district government to shift the project to the other side of Sargodha Road where at least 200 acres of government land was also available, which they claimed had been occupied by some influentials.

They project could also be shifted to the previously proposed site along Gujrat-Bhimbher road where a huge chunk of barren land owned by the provincial government was available, they suggested.

The DCO told them that at least 400 acres were required for the project, which was why the southern side of Sargodha road was not an option.

Both the DCO and the MPA asked the protesters to render this sacrifice for the uplift of the country as well as economic growth of Gujrat.

They also sought suggestions from landowners if the matter could be resolved by enhancing the price of land or sparing a part of affected villages.

The protesters dispersed peacefully when the DCO assured them of visiting the proposed site with them on Saturday.

Meanwhile, the district government in consultation with officials of the Gujrat Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GTCCI) proposed that phase 2 of the planned industrial estate be named Chenab Industrial Estate Area of Gujrat.

This was decided in a meeting held at the district government complex presided over by DCO Chattha with GTCCI President Mian Muhammad Ijaz leading a delegation of local industrialists.

The meeting was told that officials of the Punjab Small Industries Estate Department had also declared the proposed 480 acres feasible for the project, which would be linked with the GT Road by a 120-foot wide dual carriage way.

The DCO said following completion of the initial procedural work, a formal summary was being prepared for approval of the chief minister, which would be followed by the issuance of a notification of Section 4 of the Land Acquisition Act so that the district Land Revenue Department could acquire the land.

http://www.dawn.com/news/1272151/farmers-protest-land-acquisition-for-industrial-estate