Himalayan News Service

Pokhara, January 24

Squatters, displaced on Thursday by the Pokhara Valley Town Development Committee (PVTDC) from the Pokhara bus-park area, have gone off and settled on public land to the east and north of the bus-park. Around 500 households of squatters have ensconced themselves after cutting trees to make houses for themselves.

The squatters have lost no time building houses there after the Town development Committee evicted them to construct a modern bus-park. They are, however, yet to receive any news regarding their rehabilitation.

Chhetra Bahadur KC, chairperson of the Pokhara Valley Town Development Committee said that the squatters had no right to cut down trees or claim the land. Their huts are mushrooming on the land behind Salt Trading Corporation and China Bridge, near the bus-park. KC claimed he had no knowledge of their occupation of that land.

Of the 500 squatter households, only 171 were acknowledged as bonafide squatters by the National Society for Solution of Disorganized Settlement (NSSDS). The issue of their rehabilitation, however, is still undecided, said KC.

The squatters who were living in the bus-park have now dug in their heels and refused to leave the land they have grabbed. The NSSDS claimed

it would not allow any squatter’s house in the bus-park to be demolished. Squatters insisted that they had a right to take their battle for residence to the streets.

Countering chairperson KC’s claim that the squatters have not been given any land yet, Jay Lal Pun, chairperson of Ward-9 said that the squatters were given directions to live on the 25 ropanis of PVTDC-owned land, behind the Salt Trading Corporation. Pun added, "It is my right to protect squatters belonging to my ward."

He added that he would defend them to the last if the committee denies them land where they have been living on his directions.

Gandaki Transportation Independent Labourers Organization office and the traffic police office too have been shifted elsewhere to accommodate the bus-park project which started from Magh, said the Valley Town Development Committee.