In a hearing before the National Commission for Human Rights (NCHR) on December 31, the Okara Military Farms commandant Brigadier Rana Mohammed Fahim told a hearing that the Punjab government owns the Okara Military Farms.

The NCHR has asked government, military, tenant and civil society representatives to appear before it in a hearing on the ongoing Okara Military Farms dispute, which has been ongoing for 18 years.

The statement from the Okara Military Farms commandant supports our position in the 18 year-old land rights campaign that the army does not own the land. However, military officials have never admitted this fact on record before.

I had approached the NCHR in 2016 to take notice of the ongoing human rights violations in Okara.

Thirteen tenants at the farms have lost their lives during this mass movement by small farmers for ownership of land they are cultivating for over 100 years. Around 1,900 tenants have been jailed over the last few years, including over 200 peasant women. Three of the main leaders of the Anjuman Mozareen Punjab (Punjab Tenants Association) are in jail, including AMP general secretary Mehar Abdul Sattar, who is serving a 10 years jail sentence on fake cases. Sattar is also joint secretary of Pakistan Kissan Rabita Committee, a network of peasant organisations in Pakistan and a member of La Via Campisena. Another prominent AMP leader Younas Iqbal is also in jail.

AMP leader Malik Salim Jakhar was released last week on bail by the Supreme Court of Pakistan after spending almost four years in jail. He was framed in 84 fabricated police cases since 2006. AMP media adviser and elected Union Council chairman Noor Nabi was released in the last weeks of December 2018 after spending almost 19 months in jail. A local journalist, close to the movement, Husnain Raza spent 23 months in jail before he was released last year.

Most of these leaders were arrested on false police charges of murder, attempt of murder, dacoity, thefts and blocking roads. All these cases registered after tenants refused to pay the share cropping rent since 2001.

Despite the brutal repression of the AMP, only 10 percent of the tenants have agreed to pay share cropping rent. Ninety percent are still resisting.

Over 68,000 acres of land are being cultivated by tenants in different parts of Punjab in public sector agriculture farms. Tenants demanding land rights have been victims to all sort of state repression but the movement still continues.

The Pakistan Army’s acceptance that it does not own the agriculture land at Okara is a step towards the success of our campaign for land rights.

The military has accepted the NCHR as a mediator to solve the issue. Next hearing at the NCHR will be on January 17.

Army officials told the NCHR that we would wave off all the 18 years of bad debts to tenants who are not paying the share cropping rent but they have to pay that now.

The AMP representatives have told the NCHR that they do not owe share cropping rent to the Okara military administration since it does not own it. They told the NCHR that the Punjab government is the one that owns the land and should talk to the tenants directly. They said that the land should be distributed among the tenants working here for over a century.

Report by:
Farooq Tariq
General secretary
Pakistan Kissan Rabita Committee

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Okara Military Farms dispute ‘almost settled’: NCHR

LAHORE - A long-running dispute of Okara Military Farms comprising 17,000 acres of land has ‘almost been settled’ between tenants and Pakistan Army, a top NCHR official has claimed.

Punjab Member of National Commission on Human Rights (NCHR) Kishwar Shaheen Awan told The Nation that the commission arranged hearings in recent months between the two parties and the dispute has almost been settled.

“NCHR chairman played a vital role in negotiating the solution to this dispute,” the commission member said.

“As an NCHR member from Punjab, I sat in these sessions and hearings and I can say [with confidence that] core issues between the two parties have been resolved,” she added.

But Pakistan Kissan Raabta Committee General Secretary Farooq Tariq told The Nation that the announcement of settlement of the issue of ownership is unilateral and the dispute is yet to be resolved.

Kishwar however said Okara deputy commissioner and district police officer have also sent reports of the settlement of the dispute of the land that encompasses around 20 villages.

She said farmers and tenants had stopped giving the Batai (share from crops) to Pakistan Army for the last 15 years due to the dispute of land ownership.

“I think the ownership issue was clear from the day first as the land of military farms belongs to the government of Punjab, and the revenue record was a testimony of it,” she explained.

Kishwar was of the view that now the tenants will not be dislocated from their present lands and peace prevailed in the area after the resolution of the dispute.

According to BBC Urdu report, NCHR Chairman Justice (r) Ali Nawaz Chohan has said that it has been decided to withdraw the criminal cases registered against the tenants to resolve the matter.

The decision came in the hearing of the case by NCHR on December 31.

Now the ball was in tenants’ court to respond to the goodwill gesture and accept all the terms offered to them for final settlement of the matter. According to the chairman, tenants will give their response on next hearing on January 17.

Justice Chohan said in the hearing held on Monday, the army acknowledged that the land belonged to Punjab government but claimed that the institution was in possession and control of the farms which produce fodder for their cattle and horses.

According to report, it has been decided that farmers will give 50 percent share of their yield to Pakistan Army or the government.

Pakistan Kissan Raabta Committee General Secretary and Awami Workers Party spokesperson Farooq Tariq said, “PKRC filed application in 2016 before NCHR and after many hearings, now Anjuman-e-Mazaraeen Punjab will submit their response before the commission”.

He claimed that the announcement of settlement on the issue of ownership by NCHR is unilateral and the dispute is yet to be resolved.

“It should be remembered that not only the previous governments of Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif but also incumbent Prime Minister Imran Khan had promised to give Okara lands to farmers,” he pointed out.

Farooq said the farmers were cultivating these lands for last 100 years or so and therefore the land must belong to them. Even Land Reforms Commission had suggested giving them ownership, he said.

Anjuman-e-Mazaraeen Punjab second-tier leader Muhammad Ramzan said the organisation is going to meet in Lahore on January 12 to decide their further course of action

Faizan Ali Warraich

• The Nation, January 04, 2019 :
https://nation.com.pk/E-Paper/lahore/2019-01-04/page-3/detail-1

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