Punjab Chief Minister (CM) Maryam Nawaz Sharif expressed displeasure over the Lahore High Court’s (LHC) decision to suspend the Punjab Protection of Ownership of Immovable Property Act 2025 in a statement issued on Tuesday. She warned in the statement that the LHC's decision would benefit land-grab mafias and undermine public confidence in the justice system. The chief minister said the court’s decision was not in line with established principles set by the superior judiciary. 

She argued that the suspension of the law would be seen by the public as backing land mafias while dealing a blow to the hopes of poor and oppressed citizens seeking justice. CM Maryam said the legislation had been designed to provide comprehensive legal and administrative protection to vulnerable citizens and had, for the first time, empowered people to safeguard their legally owned land and property. She stressed that lawmaking was a constitutional right of the provincial assembly and could not be curtailed.

Highlighting the significance of the law, she said it introduced a 90-day timeframe for deciding land and property disputes that had historically dragged on for years and even generations. She added that land cases often remained subject to stay orders for decades and that the new law was drafted on the basis of evidence to address longstanding injustices. The chief minister said the legislation was enacted to assist millions of people across Punjab who had suffered for decades at the hands of powerful land mafias.

She clarified that the law was not intended for her personal benefit, nor had its suspension caused her any personal loss.Instead, she said, the real damage would be borne by poor, destitute, helpless and oppressed citizens, including widows, whose cases were finally being addressed under the new legal framework. She said that halting the law would shatter the fragile hope of justice that many vulnerable citizens had begun to feel.

Credit: Independent News Pakistan (INP)