KARACHI: Clashes broke out between protesters and the police after the local administration launched an anti-encroachment drive to raze a shopping mall on the premises of the Aladdin amusement park on Karachi’s Rashid Minhas Road.
Shop owners and their employees gathered in large numbers to protest the drive. They clashed with the police when the district administration reached the amusement park with heavy machinery to demolish the mall built on the park.
They hurled stones at the personnel who, in retaliation, used batons and tear gas to disperse the crowd. Several protesters were arrested.
The district administration launched the anti-encroachment drive on the directives of the Supreme Court.
READ: SC orders demolition of Aladdin shopping mall, Pavilion End Club
On Monday, the Supreme Court directed the local administration to remove the Pavilion End Club and stop all commercial activities on the premises of the Aladdin amusement park in Karachi’s Gulshan-e-Iqbal.
The court directed the Karachi administrator to file a compliance report within two days.
The directions were given by an apex court bench headed by Chief Justice Pakistan Gulzar Ahmed while hearing a case related to the shopping centre and club near Aladdin Water Park at the SC’s Karachi Registry.
