Was allegedly set up in Landa Bazaar park around five decades agoIllegal temple to have permanent structure

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, December 18

An illegal makeshift temple, constructed on a park land in Landa Bazaar locality decades ago, is now going to have a proper building. Residents of Guru Nanak Nagar locality, which is the official name of Landa Bazaar, say that traders were using the temple to cover up their encroachments on the prime land. Even the park is not properly visible from the road.

NS Gabarhia, a resident of the locality, displaying a reply sought under the RTI Act, said the then Municipal Town Planner (MTP) in a communiqué to then Deputy Commissioner on October 7, 2010, had advocated razing the illegal structure after the department was provided adequate security. He feared occurrence of an untoward incident and a law and order problem during the anti-encroachment drive.

Even after a lapse of 11 years, the district administration could not spare force and a duty magistrate.

He said after migrating from Pakistan, his family had procured the land in Abadi Bawa Ishar Das.

Later, the Amritsar Improvement Trust took over the Abadi in 1964 and named it Guru Nanak Nagar. They allotted plots and carved out three parks and roads. At that time there was no temple there and later a makeshift temple was raised there.