Karachi DHA’s Admin Digs Up Ground Outside Shops To ‘Improve Security’

Karachi’s Defence Housing Authority (DHA) and Defence police administration have dug up the ground outside several tea shops in DHA in a bid to improve security by stopping shopkeepers from placing tables outside for customers. The move comes after the recent kidnapping of a girl from outside a tea shop in the area.

According to a report in Express Tribune, the DHA administration has dug up the ground outside shops using hand tools and machinery to prevent shopkeepers from placing tables for customers outside.

The administration has also warned shopkeepers to not put tables and chairs outside, and those that do not follow this order may be arrested.

Shop owners have told media that they had previously been directed to close their shops by midnight.

The administration’s decision is supposedly aimed at preventing any untoward incidents like the one wherein a student, Dua Mangi, was kidnapped from outside a tea shop recently. Mangi was walking with a friend outside a tea shop in Bukhari Commercial Area when she was abducted.

A shop keeper complained to media that instead of providing security to citizens, the administration was taking such measures which was not understandable.

Shop owners have said that the move may affect staff and waiters who worked in these shops on daily wages.