On orders of Ombudsman Punjab Maj (r) Azam Suleman Khan, the Vehari administration, while taking action on public complaints, has retrieved 26 kanal land from illegal occupants, while another 15 acres of government land has been auctioned to fetch 30 million rupees to government kitty. This was stated by the spokesman of the Office of the Ombudsman Punjab in a statement issued on Thursday. The spokesman noted that the involvement of the ombudsman's office in public complaints resulted in the retrieval of a total of 47 kanal state land in Bahawalnagar and the amount of the crop has also been deposited in the treasury.

In a similar development, a 4.17 kanal piece of land has been recovered by the administration in Gujranwala after the ombudsman's office interceded on a public complaint. Likewise, illegal encroachments, worth one million rupees, have been cleared in Mianwali to restore public passage after the ombudsman's office interacted in the public interest, the spokesman mentioned.

Following the instructions of the ombudsman's office on a separate application, the administration in Taunsa Sharif has restored possession of 100 kanal of government land to the complainant under the agricultural graduate land scheme. The ombudsman's office also interacted to give possession of 16.17 kanal of land back to its rightful owner Sultan Ahmad Khan, an overseas Pakistani of Toba Tek Singh, the spokesman reported.

The total market value of the retrieved lands in different districts is 61.54 million rupees, the spokesman mentioned. Alongside this, the administration in Kasur has settled 2938 cases of mutation of lands after an own-motion notice of the provincial ombudsman Azam Suleman Khan on a news item and this has relieved the local land owners, the spokesman concluded.

Credit : Independent News Pakistan-INP