25 December 2004	Saturday	12 Ziqa'ad 1425

LAHORE, Dec 24: The suspended Ravi Town Nazim, Amer Munir, was declared proclaimed offender by a local Anti-Corruption Court on Friday for not appearing before it.

He was granted pre-arrest protective bail by the Lahore High Court's Rawalpindi bench with a direction to move the relevant court.

He moved court for pre-arrest bail which was fixed for Friday for arguments, but he did not appear. As a result, the court dismissed his petition and issued notice to the surety.

Meanwhile, a joint raiding team comprising senior officers of the Anti-Corruption Department and the city police has been constituted for the arrest of Mr Munir, who along with some other officials of the town, is involved in embezzling government funds amounting to Rs45 million. Official sources said the federal government had also been moved to place name of the absconding Nazim on the Exit Control List.

BANKRUPTCY: Ravi Town had been drained of almost all its resources and was on the verge of bankruptcy on account of the corrupt practices of fugitive Nazim Amer Munir and his cronies when the Anti-Corruption Establishment decided to proceed against them early this month.

Disclosing this while talking to Dawn on Friday, the town officer (finance) said only Rs300,000 had been left in the accounts after payment of Rs1.8 million salaries to nearly 300 regular and 114 work charged employees when the ACE arrested the former town municipal and some other officers after its investigations. He said several others fled.

The new town municipal officer, Dr Usman Anwar, said he and other town officers had collected over Rs4 million during the past 22 days, raising the deposits to Rs4.5 million after issuing notices to all the tax collectors. Nearly Rs2.5 million had been raised from the tax on the transfer of property alone.

He said around Rs900,000 had been collected in the form of the site plan sanction fee during the past 22 days whereas only an average Rs400,000 per month had been received on this account during the last five months.

He said he had also approached the provincial government for the disbursement of the town's monthly grant of Rs1.5 million. The absconding town Nazim had not bothered to draw the grant in the past three months due to his preoccupation with other matters. He said release of the assistance would further strengthen the town's financial position.