KHYBER: The controversy over the construction of an ‘illegal’ commercial plaza at the site of an old Hindu temple in Landi Kotal has resurfaced as some influential people are pressuring authorities concerned to issue a no-objection certificate (NOC) for the building, according to sources.
They told this scribe that some influential people were putting pressure on Landi Kotal Tehsil Municipal Administration (TMA) officials to issue NOC for the newly-built commercial plaza while insisting on the existence of the Hindu temple on the ground floor.
However, TMA officials declined to issue the NOC while insisting that the commercial building too was not approved from them as per rules, sources said.
They said that Khyber district administration and Landi Kotal TMO were at loggerheads since April 2024 when construction of the plaza was started while over a century-old temple was demolished during the night with the district administration refusing to acknowledge the existence of temple but TMA officials insisted that legal requirements for construction of a commercial building were not fulfilled.
Some influential people ‘pressurising’ Landi Kotal TMA to issue NOC
TMA officials insisted that the ‘illegal and secret demolition’ of the Hindu temple apart, the construction of a commercial building at the controversial site too was carried out in violation of building rules and regulations as the plaza owner had only approached the district administration for permission of renovation of some old shops at the said site, adjacent to the demolished temple.
They said that neither the ownership of the controversial site was proved by the so-called plaza owners, nor the TMA engineer was allowed to visit the site prior to approval of the building map or drawing while report about the relevant revenue record by the then patwari and tehsildar was also absent so an NOC could not be issued.
Sources said that the district administration in collaboration with the contractor of the controversial plaza, which was actively supported by officials of the revenue department and clerical staff of the district administration, had issued a fake NOC in 2024 while acting as caretakers of the state property in Landi Kotal bazaar.
Revenue officials had earlier said that the entire 42-kanal land of Landi Kotal bazaar was state property while the demolished temple had occupied approximately one kanal plot in the middle of the bazaar.
TMA officials said that revenue officials were yet to ascertain and establish the actual ownership of the one kanal plot of the demolished temple as they continued to scramble over the ‘obsolete’, repeatedly manipulated and poorly kept revenue record.
Locals, however, acknowledged the existence of the Hindu temple in Landi Kotal bazaar and some of them even testified that they had seen Hindus residing in the area before the partition of India, worshipping at the temple.
Haji Ameer Jan, an octogenarian from Shinwari tribe, told this scribe that local Hindus used to worship at the temple but it was closed after the 1947 partition of India as Hindu families migrated to India.
A group of local religious zealots also damaged a portion of the closed temple in Landi Kotal after Hindu extremists desecrated Babri Masjid in India in early 1990s.
Representatives from minority groups and cultural bodies had then criticised lack of preservation and insisted that Auqaf department lacked any active presence or record of such non-Muslim heritage sites in merged districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
Officials, with whom this correspondent interacted, said that the then political administration during the erstwhile Fata would look after and manage state properties, including worship places of minorities situated in tribal areas.
They said that the responsibility of looking after the places of worship of minorities was now handed over to Auqaf department but there was a lack of coordination between various government departments, while local minority communities had little say in such matters.
Published in Dawn, August 25th, 2026
