J&K Estates Department starts vacating official quarters "illegaly" occupied by former ministers, MPs

Jammu, Mar 15 : Jammu and Kashmir Estates Department on Thursday started eviction process of vacating official quarters "illegally" occupied by the former ministers and the Members Parliament.

"While the Court has vacated the stay and eviction notices were also served to the former ministers, MLAs and MPs to vacate the official accomodations," official sources here told TNN.

They said that the process has been initiated and in the begining four quarters have been vacated on Thursday.

As per sources around 100 official quarters are "illegally" occupied by the former law makers.

"We have started the process in a phased manner after Court's direction," Tasaduq Jeelani, Director Estates here told TNN.

He said that the quarters are to be vacated as per set norms.
Meanwhile on Thursday quarters of former ministers Yogesh Sawhney, Choudhary Garu Ram, MP Trilok Singh Bajwa and MLC Ashok Sharma have been vacated.

Former minister Choudhary Garu Ram told reporters, "I approached to the Court with a plea that there were around 170 people illegally occupying official quarters out of which only around 40 to 50 are genuine and rest are frauds."

"We asked the Court let all vacate the residence but the stay was vacated," he added.

He also lashed out at the PDP saying, "the day I quit PDP and rejoined Congress, I am being harrased."

"To settle personal scores, PDP headed Government ordered eviction from the quarter," he said adding that the close relatives of the Chief Minister and PDP leaders are also illegally occupying the quarters but there is nobody to vacate them.