A BRADFORD man claims a land dispute with one of his neighbours could see his £10,000 garden being bulldozed by a building developer.

Zulfiqar Shah said he, along with other residents on Frimley Drive, Little Horton, was gifted the former agricultural land behind his house by its owners, Norman and Irene Myers, to redevelop and turn into a garden.

But, solicitors have said he has no legal rights to the land, which is now said to be up for sale.

If the proposals go ahead, Mr Shah, a 48-year-old restaurant owner, and a number of other residents on the street, would see their gardens cut to around half their current size.

Mr Shah said when he bought the house, he spoke to Mr Myers, who also lives on the street, about the ownership of the land.

"I was told I could keep it as long as I maintained it," he said.

"Mr Myers said it was the same situation with all the neighbours.

"He said was sick of people dumping rubbish on it.

"If I had been told I couldn't use the land, I wouldn't have bought the house."

Another resident set to be affected by the proposed development, who said she had lived on the street for more than 25 years, but did not wish to be named, said the strip of land formerly contained a number of greenhouses which were left to rot.

"It was like a jungle," she said. "There was broken glass everywhere, it was a nightmare."

"If you've had land for 25 years and maintained it, surely you should have some rights on it."

Mr Shah said he had just finished three months of landscaping work on the garden when he received a solicitors letter stating he was trespassing on the land.

"It felt like I was being criminalised, it was very upsetting," he said.

"The land was a real mess before I tidied it up.

"It would have been stupid of me to spend even a penny on the land if I didn't think it belonged to me, I would have just left it.

"I've spent more than £10,000 on the garden.

"The owner had gifted that land to us, although only verbally, and we've maintained it and enjoyed it, knowing that was the case.

"If that has changed, we all should have sat down as neighbours and talked about it.

"The way it's been done is not nice."

Mr Shah added he had been invited to submit an offer for the full strip of land, but not solely the area in his own garden.

GSD Law, a Leeds-based firm hired to represent a number of the residents involved in the dispute, has argued Mr Myers told his neighbours they could have the land, and said people were looking to reach an "amicable settlement."

However, a letter from Hellewell, Pasley & Brewer, a firm of solicitors representing Mr and Mrs Myers, denied any residents had been maintaining the land for ten years or more, stating that, in any event, that was "an irrelevance to the legal issues."

The letter, dated December 5, read: "It is looking favourite that our client will sell the land to a building developer, who is aware of the situation of your client's trespassing.

"As your clients have not removed themselves from our client's land, then the very real probability is that their gardens will be bulldozed in the next week or two to make way for the new development."

No-one from Hellewell, Pasley & Brewer responded to a request for a comment.