Edhi Welfare Centers Are Being Occupied By Land Mafia Illegally

The Great and late welfare worker and philanthropist Abdul Sattar Edhi who served the people selflessly, picked those dead bodies who were not even touched by their relatives, reared orphans children, reached to underprivileged for humanitarian services, his ambulances shifted people injured in road accidents to hospitals and saved many lives: is now days victimized by land grabbers. His widow Bilqees was tearing in press conference on this brutal act. The Foundation has appealed to Sindh and federal government to free the non-profit welfare centers in various parts of the province from illegal occupation of influential land mafias. Addressing a press conference at Karachi Press club Adhi's widow Bilqees and his son Faisal said that one of the centers was occupied in Sindh-Balochistan border town of Hub. They further said that the land mafia occupying the welfare centers enjoyed the patronage of certain political parties, he added that shops and other commercial constructions were erected after razing the centers that had been serving humanity for the last three decades. Some of them have been locked by these land grabbers, whose intention seems to convert these humanitarian centers into commercial hubs, said the Edhi family. They said lands for these welfare centers was were alloted by National Highway Authority (NHA), which had awarded the Edhi Foundation with the written authority to set up on any point on 200-square meters belts on both sides of the highways. The last target of land grabbers, they said, the Edhi welfare center in Thatta that had been successfully functioning since 1985 on NHA land. The teary-eyed Bilqees bemoaned that the land mafia was targeting the Edhi Foundation with the intent to destroy the organization and that there seemed to be no one to stop them. She feared that Edhi ambulances and non-profit's workers were without any shelter or safety, "These evil forces could damage the vehicles and harm the volunteers." The Edhi family listed all the parts of the province where the welfare centers had been illegally occupied: Latifabad town in the southern suburbs of Hyderabad city, Moro and Qazi Ahmad towns in late Benazeerabad district, Sehwan city, Hala Town, Larkana city and Hub Chauki in Balochistan's Lasbela district.