June 23, 2007	Saturday	Jamadi-us-Sani 07, 1428

TAXILA, June 22: Believe it or not, but if you want a room in Gurdwara Punja Sahib, a sacred place of Sikhs in Hassanabdal, you can get it on rent, but all you have to do is grease the palms of the officials of the Evacuee Trust Property Board (ETPB).

It has been learnt that officials of Evacuee Trust Property Board (ETPB), which looks after this religious place of the Sikhs, are allegedly minting money by renting out rooms in the old residential block of the Gurdwara to people from the Sikh community who do business in Hassanabdal, Haripur, Taxila and Rawalpindi. This practice is done in sheer violation of law and moral values.

The illegal practice of renting out reserved rooms in the residential block of the Gurdwara came to light when a man residing in the room was deprived of Rs40,200 by his roommate on Wednesday. The room was given on rent to five Sikhs who belonged to different areas and were presently living together and doing some business.

It has been learnt that Satnam Singh, a resident of Khyber Agency, worked as a Hakeem and resided in the room. One day, he found his suitcase open and Rs40,200 missing.

He reported the matter to the caretaker and other staff members of Evacuee Trust Property Board (ETPB), but they tried to hush up the matter and did not allow him to lodge a complaint with the local police as it would reveal all there misdoings and violation of rules.

Satnam Singh reported the matter to the army authorities in Rawalpindi, after which a four-member team, led by JCO Nawaz, along with two sniffer dogs reached the place.

After taking into custody all belongings present there, the sniffer dogs were released to track the thief. The dogs separately indicated Inderjeet Singh, a resident of Peshawar, who also lived in the same room. However, while negotiations were continuing, the culprit managed to escape.

As the issue could bring a bad name to the management of the ETPB and expose the corruption allegedly committed by the caretaker staff of the Gurdwara, the officials concerned are still pressing the victim (Satnam Singh) not to report the matter to the local police.

After the scam was unearthed, a sensitive agency also reported the sorry state of affairs of the Gurdwara to their highups and termed the practice a ‘high risk’ which may lead to some unpleasant incident and earn a bad name to the country.

Sources in the ETPB told this reporter that according to rules, a room could be provided to any Sikh or Hindu yatree whether he is local or foreigner for a maximum of three days.

Social and public circles have called upon the senior officials of the ETPB to take stalk of the situation and put the affairs of the board straight.

Imran to address Taxila bar: Chief of Pakistan Tehreek Insaf Imran Khan would address Taxila bar association (TBA) on Saturday.