ISLAMABAD: This year the Capital Development Authority CDA) has set up the temporary cattle market for Eidul Azha sacrifices in Sector I-12/2 instead of Sector I-11 and citizens are unhappy with the new site.

They feel the location of the new site near the Railway Carriage Factory on a busy arterial road will pose access problems both to buyers and sellers.

`CDA`s choice is not a wise one,` said Islamabad resident Naeem Ahmed. `While the old I-11 site was accessible from many sides, the new one can be accessed only via I.J.P. Road which is open to all kinds of traffic from inter-city trucks and buses to commuters.

A CDA source noted that the new site auctioned last Thursday fetched Rs10 million, less than half what the Rs21 million the I-11 site brought to the CDA last year.

Some citizens, however, believe CDA can still get more money by calling new bids for the old I-11 site, which offers more open space after the sector has been cleared of the slum dwellers.

The Sector I-12/2 cattle market will cater to buyers of sacrificial animals from Rawalpindi and Islamabad and is expected to do most business from first Zil Haj to 13 Zil Haj.

CDA will provide services like water, electricity, cleaning, ambulance, fire brigade etc at the place.

`Since the sector has only one access to the space in front of the Carriage Factory, transportation of animals and buyers will have to wade through the heavy traf fic that flows on the main road there all the time,` said citizen Ahsanul Haq.

`It will be much easier for them if the market is shif ted to its old site in sector I-11 which can be accessed from Police Lines and the Sabzi Mandi sides as well as from Rawalpindi and the Metro store,` he said.

`Moreover, a number of cattle sellers used to do business on the green belt between sectors I-11 and I-10, served by all the access roads from I-10,` he added.Citizen Sohail Jameel had a peculiar preference for the old I-11 site. `In the past, I used to go to the Eidul Azha cattle market with my old mother. She selected the animal while sitting in the car,` he told Dawn. `I don`t think I will be able to purchase the animal of her choice this year.

`Hundreds of thousands of people visit the cattle market and the CDA should have thought of a place for the market which was easy to access from many sides by roads,` he added.

It looked strange to him that the CDA mandarins chose a different site this year and for less money even though the demolition of the I-11 katchi abadi of fered a much bigger area for the cattle market.

CDA spokesperson Ramzan Sajid, while talking to Dawn, said that because development work had started in the cleared sector I-11, the CDA proposed to establish the cattle market near Sangjani. `However bidders were not ready to bid for that site as they believed that people will not go that far to buy cattle. So it was decided to establish the market in sector I-12/2,` he said.