Safari Villas Bahria Town Lahore: A Living Experience (Part 4)

(This article was published and posted in June 2007)
It is now almost a year when my family shifted in Safari Villas Bahria Town Lahore. There were always many positive additions here which kept on providing sense of great feeling to witness the development. A wonderful development, road networks, over security, parks, beautiful mosque, mini zoo, market, shops, restaurants, transport services, school, hospital, kids playing area and electricity availability round the clock. There are other good additions in the area and a PERMANENT CHANGE and constant improvement makes the Safari Villas enjoyable.

There are some new developments in Bahria Town Lahore which are also directly related to Safari Villas which I wanted to share with you. 

1. The Meadows enhances the beauty of Bahria Town Lahore. There are worth visiting sites in the Meadows project which are in final stages. 
2. Bahria Town School Lahore has been affiliated with Cambridge for its O level and A Level exams. Besides this it has affiliation with Agha Khan Board for Matric. The quality of education in School is satisfactory and fees structure is very much on low side. As per school's Principal Ms. Naghmana Ambreen, the fees are very much subsidized. Pick and drop for Safari residents is free. 
3. New restaurants has been started. Yummy 36 is now serving better along with its Ice Cream Parlor and restaurant. De Olive Green has vast open area as it is situated in Shaheen Park. 
4. Sham-e-Ghazal, Jashn-e-Baharan and Youm-e-Azadi March etc are the events which were arranged during last few months. 
5. A very beautiful mosque is now completed. Juma prayer, Eid Namaz and Taraveeh can be offered in Safari Villas, Masjide Qurtaba. 
6. Bahria Town Management has started yearly white wash and coloring of all the villas without charging any thing from the owners.
7. Bahria Town Management has taken its responsibility to remove the problems in the making and construction. Almost every tile of my villas has been replaced. All the faults were considered by Bahria Town and they accept as their responsibility. 
8. Movie Theater, Community Hall is under construction. Its speed of construction shows that these will be ready within next month. 
A contract with AFC has been made and they are supposed to open their branch within next month. 
9. AFC has a plan to have a general Store or Mart type of shop along with their Fried Chicken.
10. As Sui Gas bills were not accepted by PICIC bank, Bahria Town Lahore Branch so Bahria Town office is taking the responsibility of depositing these bills. 
11. Hospital has more facilities as Specialists / Consultants are available in their clinics (within the hospital) from 8 AM to 4 PM. Emergency is functional 24 hours basis. Unfortunately we needed hospital facilities - both consultancy as well as Emergency - and we found it very professional and economical.


I do want to share with you my disappointments with Bahria Town.

1. Bahria Town Management has almost stopped their completion work in Safari Villas as well as in Sector C. It seems that their work force as well as machinery remained busy either in The Meadows or in their project on Raiwind Road. 
2. Though they take full responsibility of removing their construction faults but they are not quick in this regard. Their customer service for solving daily problems is VERY prompt and professional. It does happen that their team reaches on spot before returning of the complainer to his/her villa. 
3. They are not able to provide PTCL phone lines to all the villas. Though they have provided V Wireless phones but many people are not comfortable with it due to its limitation (Mainly it does not have extension option). 
4. Cable network in NOT under control of Bahria Management so their service is not upto the mark. 
5. Internet Services are not yet provided by Bahria Town. 
6. Life is NOT enjoyable in Safari Villas NOWADAYS due to too much electricity shut down. Bahia Town has totally FAILED in providing this facility during last three days. Their rates for electricity unit are on higher side and their service in this regard is pathetic.
Thanks for your time.

Visitor replied on Friday, June 15, 2007 12:29 AM PST Thanks for very valuable insight. I think the only problem with Bahria has been its location, probably it is the farthest of all current and new socities. As far as development is concerned, it can be said that it matches that of DHA. And due to this location thing, most probably DHA will take away most of the international real estate investment (hotels, commercial buildings etc) like they have floated the opportunities inDHA-8 (parkview)recently in newspapers.

tzk replied on Friday, June 15, 2007 09:02 AM PST thanks very much for such detailed and unbiased/critical information. Please tell bahria management that phone and internet are like blood for life these days. We can no survive without them. Most expats who are thinking of settling down in pakistan is because of these facilities. If we have highly reliable phone and high speed internet service(without interruption), a lot of pakistani people can move back and work from there.

tzk replied on Friday, June 15, 2007 09:08 AM PST Visitor & Ali a few things 1. quality of development of bahria is way better than dha 2. a lot of people prefer dha for the name (status symbol) 3. new phases of dha are atleast as far from lahore as bahria. 4. approach to dha is not as good as bahria (multan road, canal, defence road) 5. distance these days is more of a psychological issue than a practical issue. A visit from gulberg to railway station will take more time than a visit from gulberg to bahria. similarly it is much faster to go to bahria from garden town, ichra, mall road, samanabad, mazand than to go to dha 6. Real ali, please learn to respect the opposing view. We all need to learn to disagree with respect. This is our national delima that when we disagree we lose temper and cant absorb why the other person does not think on the same lines i do.

Hussain replied on Friday, June 15, 2007 01:24 PM PST Dear 'The real ali' It is my unbiased opinion that u got offended without any reason, Mr. Visitor has the right to differ with anyone on solid reasons.

Aziz replied on Friday, June 15, 2007 04:18 PM PST Dear Hussain Bhai, Thank you very much for such a detailed analysis and time for posting the valueable comments. Dear Real Ali, I have noticed that you are some what very uncomfortable with DHA, and usually do not like any one taking its side or speaking for it. It is just a brotherly request to let people say what they have to say and you also share your views with us all. Thanks

tzk replied on Saturday, June 16, 2007 08:30 AM PST dear real ali It is always hard to understand others point of view. It is a lot of times thought how come the other person does not understand something so simple. The actual reason is that two people are looking at the same thing from two different angels. Please dont get offended when people say something about one society or the other and you can not absorb the reason behind their statements

Hussain Kaisrani replied on Sunday, June 17, 2007 02:54 PM PST Salaam and Thanks for comments of friends. I am here again to provide latest updates regarding my post. The main problem in Safari Villas was too much electricity shut down which created serious problems for three days. It is worth mentioning that Bahria Town management took the matter seriously and ordered a new power generator (worth Thirty million Rupees) which has been installed and started working from yesterday. After solution of this big problem and due to wonderful weather, life is more enjoyable in Safari Villas nowadays. Thanks.

Usman, UK replied on Monday, June 18, 2007 04:17 PM PST Dear Mr. Kaisrani, thanks for sharing your views and experience. I just want to support what you said as I have the same experience as my family is living there. It is simply wonderful. Distance is not a big problem if you have your convayance. It is rather better to be in a quiet and clear atmosphere. If someone wants to construct a house, BT is the best place at present. If you want to invest for some quick return, then keep on playing around in different societies including DHA. No society at present matches with BT in terms of its standards of development and facilities. It is crystal clear. Bt is going to the winner finally due to its development standards, facilities,and low price. I was shocked to see a picture of house under construction in Phase-6, in an latest post. Just compare it with BT, you will get what I want to say. No further comments as it may hurt many on this forum.