Christmas gala at F/9 Park

The Capital Development Authority (CDA) Chairman Farkhand Iqbal on Saturday said the Christian community was playing a pivotal role in the development of the capital city and deserved laurels for their services. He said this while addressing a two-day colourful Christmas Gala “Colours of Islamabad Christmas Carnival”, organised by the CDA at Fatima Jinnah F-9 Park.
The Christmas Gala participated by the families of the Christian as well as other communities living in different areas of the city, according to a press statement. The first ever Christian family gala organised in the history of Islamabad comprised of different stalls, shops, food courts, game shows and play-rides for the children and other festivities designed specially for the Christmas. The site has also been decorated with the Christmas trees and Santa Claus. A large numbers of families and children visited the spot and lauded the efforts of CDA for organizing such a beautiful event. Farkhand Iqbal said the CDA had organised a number of programmes for the Christian community to commemorate their efforts for the development of Islamabad.
“The Christian community around the world, especially those living in Islamabad, on this happy occasion celebrated the birth of Jesus Christ. The practice of lighting up Christmas Tree on behalf of CDA began a couple of years ago and is being expended with every passing year to add more colours to the Christmas celebrations,” he said.
He said Christmas trees had been lit-up in different areas of the federal capital in addition to a number of colourful events, including this gala at F-9 Park.
He reiterated the CDA had always taken pride for having the peaceful and hardworking community along in the journey of development and making Islamabad a model city. “The way the Christian employees of CDA have kept the city clean, especially during Eid-ul-Azha for the last many years is a remarkable achievement, which has always been appreciated not only by the locals but also by the foreign dignitaries living in the Federal Capital.”
He said the salaries of the sanitation staff had been increased at par with the other employees working in the authority in addition to upgrading their Basic Pay Scales. The CDA has allotted a plot for church on which construction has commenced. Under the government policy of housing for the poor, the CDA has allotted plots to the Christian community in different sectors opened from time to time and also given them propriety rights in the existing slums. Out of the 10 registered slums, four have already been upgraded and development of the remaining is in progress. The CDA has also allotted 4000 plots to the dwellers and another 2,000 allotments are in the process under the Modern Urban Shelter Project Programme.