LAHORE: The affairs of the Walled City Lahore Authority (WCLA) last Thursday took a dramatic turn when its director general suddenly resigned and a Lahore High Court `reprimanded` him for holding `private` functions in monuments and protected sites, especially the Lahore Fort.

But there is much more to this resignation than meets the eye.

Legally, the judge is correct. But let me list a few events over the last one month that have taken place, all of which are connected to the Walled City of Lahore. Firstly, all of a sudden, a new organisation was suddenly set up titled the Lahore Authority for Heritage Revival (LAHR), whose objectives were exactly the same as that of the WCLA. To top it, PML-N chief Mian Nawaz Sharif is to serve as its patron-in-chief of its steering committee. The question that comes to mind is: `Is this a political move`? Secondly, all the members of the steering committee are serving bureaucrats, For politicians, dictating serving bureaucrats without any questions asked is easy. So, in a way a new`Sharif` dictatorship has forced itself on the WCLA. The serving Punjab chief minister, daughter of Nawaz Sharif, declared that she wanted to bring back The Mall of Lahore to its `lost glory`, with a better wider road and pavements to walk on. She also mentioned that she wanted to restore the `blue dome` of the famed Nila Gumbad.

To capture power from the WCLA, which was created in 2012 with the support of the late Aga Khan, it seems that the first task was to take control of all the historical monuments and ancient sites. So, a legal course was set in motion and the Lahore Fort, which was originally in the legal control of the archaeology department since the British days, was taken away from the WCLA and returned to the archaeology department.

That was legally put in place.

Once that legal process was in motion, the Sharifs declared that they would restore/conserve/rebuild all the lost gateways of Lahore, as well as the lost walls of the ancient city.

The bricks of these walls and gateways were stolen after the events of 1947 by the traders moving in to build houses and shops. That in itself was and remains an illegal act.But traders have a way of making the most illegal acts look like they are legal. So, in a slow-motion operation, all the walls disappeared as did most of the gateways. The creation of the WCLA had, as one of its objectives, the restoration of these walls and gateways as well as all the historic monuments inside the city, including the Lahore Fort. In this context, one must say that given scarce resources,it has done an excellent job.

The WCLA is today recognised as one of the finest organisations in the field of `archaeological restoration-conservation` recognised by UNESCO. It has worked with the Aga Khan Trust for Culture, a world-leading Islamic cultural organization for the restoration of the Lahore Fort, the Shahi Hammam, the Wazir Khan Mosque, plus the world`s largest wall picture of the Lahore Fort.

Other monuments have also been restored, and suddenly Lahore started presenting a very different picture.

With these visible positives, there was one aspect that definitely portrayed a negative aspect, and that was the functionality of these sites, which is why the WCLA chief got in trouble. The laws and rules laid downby UNESCO clearly state: `Dietary restriction in such sites is attributed to allergies, food intolerance and cultural and religious beliefs`. It goes without saying that the opening of food outlets and wedding functions are a massive violation of these rules/laws. All over the world such sites ban the holding of food and music events. That they abounded in Lahore was blatantly irresponsible. For that, Mr Kamran Leghari was criticised, and rightly so. Earlier in his career, the Islamabad High Court stopped him from opening a US-owned eatery in a public park. But besides these activities, which, it seems, he allowed to promote tourism and, very successfully at that, he did a superb job.

Now comes this LAHR creation. Once it announced an aggressive plan as described above, the traders went on strike. Mind you, the law very clearly states that in a residential area not more than 15pc of buildings should allow commercial activities. In the year 2025, the total commercial area captured by traders is over 67pc.

All the captured buildings are illegal, and they certainly need to be returned to residential status. This illegality is the reasonthe original inhabitants left their beloved old city to live in faraway areas.

Now comes the primary contradiction. This newly created political-bureaucratic LAHR primarily represents the trader classes of Lahore. How can the leaders go against the very people who finance their political activities? To kill off a worldclass heritage conservation-restoration organization to please traders is nothing short of criminal.

But then the promise of restoring old Lahore to its legally correct position is a stand that one cannot dispute.

For that the traders will have to be relocated, and illegal structures knocked down. Will the traders allow that? Will the trader-backed politicians back away after the next election? Will a world-class WCL A be broken up? Only time will tell.

Mind you, the chief of Punjab`s archaeology has promised to build a theme park at Harappa. As he takes over the Lahore Fort and the WCLA is ejected, how will matters move now that its chief has resigned? A new powerful and highly educated DG of the WCLA is the need of the hour. The real fight begins now.