ICC Note: Twenty four Christian families from Pakistan have petitioned the Pakistani government to make good on a promise to compensate them for houses that were demolished without notice in 1992. Christians, who often live in urban slums, often have their homes targeted for demolition when construction projects are initiated. Will Pakistan compensate these families for the homes that were destroyed in 1992?

09/03/2018 Pakistan (Dawn) – Twenty-four Christian families have urged the prime minister and the chief justice of Pakistan to help them get three-marla plots which were allotted to them in 1992 against their houses demolished without any notice.

They say they were not given plots as compensation despite four orders of the Lahore High Court from time to time.

In a petition addressed to the prime minister and the chief justice of Pakistan, their representative Dr Yaqoob Bhatti said the 24 affected families were the old residents of Christian Colony, Bhekeywal, Nizam Block and Link Wahdat Road. “Certain elements made the LDA demolish their houses and a church without any notice in 1992. The families were manhandled for putting up resistance,” he said.

He said Christians from Lahore and outstations lodged strong protests in front of the Chief Minister’s Secretariat in GOR-I and the then MPAs, Mian Mehmoodur Rashid and Adil Sharif (minorities), conveyed the injustice to chief minister Mian Manzoor Wattoo. He summoned the LDA director general and reprimanded him. On his orders, the LDA director general allotted alternative three-marla plots to the 24 families in Khyber Block, Nadeem Shaheed Road and Allama Iqbal Town as compensation.

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