The red Xs appeared on walls around Sahil Maseeh’s neighbourhood one morning in March.

They were visible on key points around their locality. No warning. No explanation. Just a cross in red paint, crude but deliberate, with CDA scrawled alongside — the signature of demolition.

Sahil lives in Allama Iqbal Colony in Islamabad’s Sector G-7, a neighbourhood that houses more than 1,000 Christian families. He has worked as a sanitary worker for the Capital Development Authority (CDA) for over two decades. His home — begun as a tent, finished in concrete — now bears the mark of eviction.

“How can we be expected to just abandon our own houses?” he asks. “We work for the CDA. We have lived here for 20 years.”

The CDA’s demolition teams have already destroyed several homes and shops in Allama Iqbal Colony. Resistance from residents temporarily stalled the bulldozers, but the red Xs remain — a daily reminder that their homes are on a list.

They built Islamabad’s homes, cleaned its streets and raised its children. Now the city’s metropolitan authority is demolishing their lives…

They built Islamabad’s homes, cleaned its streets and raised its children. Now the city’s metropolitan authority is demolishing their lives…

The Christian community of Islamabad forms the backbone of the capital’s most essential services. Men work as sanitary workers for the CDA itself. Women serve as domestic help across the city’s affluent sectors. They are the ones who keep Islamabad running — collecting its waste, cleaning its homes, maintaining its streets.

Yet the city has never produced a housing policy for them. The CDA has launched only one low-income housing scheme since the turn of the century — in the rural locality of Alipur Farash. It accommodated a few hundred........

© Dawn (Magazines)