Sameer Nazir
KARACHI: Sindh Chief Minister has said that initially 55,000 acres of land has been indentified at Taluka Shah Bandar to start the works for the establishment of mega residential city project Zulfiqar Abad. The Sindh Government has decided to expedite the working on this important project and to remove all bottlenecks if any in the way of its implementations.
This was decided in the meeting presided by Chief Minister Sindh Syed Qaim Ali Shah to review over the progress of works on the mega city project of Zulfiqar Abad held at CM House Karachi today. Advisor to CM for Finance Syed Murad Ali Shah, Senior member Board of Revenue Malik Israr, Principal Secretary to CM Alamdin Bullo, Secretary Finance Sohail Rajput, MD Zulfiqar Abad Lt. Gen. (Rtd) Iftikhar Hussain Shah, consulted revenue Nazar Muhammad Leghari and other officers from Board of Revenue (BOR) and Zulfiqar Abad project attended the meeting.
Addressing the meeting, the Chief Minister Sindh Syed Qaim Ali Shah said that this is a very important project of the Sindh, it to pave the ways and new avenues of progress and prosperity for the people of Sindh. However he said that the progress of its implementation has been remained slow because of different reasons.
He said that though this project was conceived on 1.3 million acres of land but till date 55,000 acres at Taluka Shah Bundar has been identified to start the working on project. He directed the officers to undertake survey and at least one lac acres of land should be brought under the city plan on its initial stage.
The Chief Minister Sindh directed the Revenue Officers, to complete the demarcation of proposed Government land and purchase the private land within the premises of the project and transfer to the project management at earliest. Talking on the problem of litigation of a contractor for the construction of 44Km express way of the project, the Chief Minister Sindh asked the Advocate General to approach the court and get the stay order evacuated.
The Chief Minister Sindh directed the management to engage reputed city Architectural firms in this task and Sindh Government to help them in all sense. The MD Zulfiqar Abad Lt. Gen. (Rtd) Iftikhar Hussain Shah while briefing the meeting said that actually this project was conceived on 1.3 million acres of land, but 0.9 million acres was under the sea.
Besides, the remaining land is in fragment condition; as such his administration has to face, difficulties, however initially they have planned to start from Shah Bandar where at least 55,000 acres of land is available. He said that this year his management needs Rs. 1.7 billion for land acquisition, Rs. 1.3 billion for road construction and Rs. 1.4 billion for the construction of bridges.
He said that construction work on the Express way was on halt, because of stay order issued by Hon. Court to another contractor whose services were terminated because of substandard work added that they have engaged a high caliber and reputed Advocate to get it vacated.
Sameer Nazir
KARACHI: The Chief Minister Sindh Syed Qaim Ali Shah has expressed his dissatisfaction over the implementation on the village gasification plan of the Sindh Government by executing authority Sui-Southern Gas Company, despite of providing Rs. 6.5 billion in advance since last two years. He directed the authority concerned to complete all 1108 village gasification schemes by this year without fail. This he directed while presiding over meeting of village gasification at CM House Karachi today.
The Advisor to CM for Finance Syed Murad Ali Shah, Principal Secretary to CM Alamddin Bullo, Secretary to Finance Sohail Rajput, Secretary Energy Agha Wasif Abbas, Senior General Manager SSGC Dr. Ilyas and other officers from Sindh Government and SSGC attended the meeting.
Addressing the meeting, the Chief Minister Sindh said that as many as 1108 schemes of village gasification were assigned to the management of Sui-Southern Gas Company in 2011 with advance many of Rs. 6.5 but till yet after two years the SSGC Management enable to complete only 648 and remaining 460 schemes are still in pending with Rs. 2.5 billion in their hand which is injustice to the people of Sindh Government who are even knocking the doors of the judiciary to get relief.
He said that when money was with them (SSGC), approved schemes were with them, then there was no justification to keep the schemes pending since the years. He asked the officers to complete the all schemes of village gasification provided them in 2011 with amount of Rs. 6.5 billion by the end of this financial year. He also directed them to keep the balance amount of Sindh Government in the bank of Sindh Bank as decided earlier.
The advisor to CM Sindh Syed Murad Ali Shah said that in previous meeting in the month of March 2014, it was decided that the balance amount of Sindh Government Rs. 2.5 billion would be transferred and transacted through Sindh Bank but the management of SSGC did not responded till yet. He said that delay in execution, simultaneously keeping billion of rupees in hand was causing financial losses to Sindh Government and difficulties to common men.
He asked the management of SSGC to transfer the resources from other side and complete these schemes by the end of this financial year.
The Senior General Manager Dr. Ilyas while briefing the meeting said that since 2008 till date they have received the schemes of village gasification up to 1502 out of which 648 so far have been completed. He said that the delay in implementation on schemes was because of limitation of OGRA.