LAHORE: As many as 700 buildings across the provincial capital have been identified as unfit to live in, according to a report by the Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA).
The authority asked the City District Government Lahore (CDGL) and the Walled City of Lahore Authority (WCLA) to launch an operation to evacuate or demolish the dilapidated buildings. This was revealed in a survey report conducted by the administration of nine towns of the city government and the WCLA on the orders of the Punjab government.
The CDGL’s constituent towns assigned a task to special squads to start inspection of dangerous buildings to vacate or demolish these with an aim to avoid any untoward incident in monsoon season. According to statistics of the official report, 453 out of total 700 buildings were declared dangerous in the towns while more than 264 were identified as unsafe in WCLA.
According to officials, the WCLA had nine wards within its jurisdiction where total 264 units had been found unfit to live in out of which 68 had been demolished by the WCLA during last year and the process is still continuing. Municipal Services Executive District Officer Sardar Naseem said that the administration of towns had the main executing role.
He said that following the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) of the town officers, the administration had started issuing notices to owners of the buildings to vacate immediately before starting of monsoon or demolish the buildings on their own expenses to avoid any loss to neighbouring people.
More than 200 buildings have also been recommended for necessary repair in the towns and the task will be completed after Eid. Such buildings that had not been demolished by the owners so far would be demolished by the CDGL and expenses would be collected from the owners.
According to the officials of the city district government, an operation against dangerous buildings had been started and these building would be evacuated or demolished as early as possible to avoid any danger.
