LAHORE, Dec 25: Home Secretary Nadeem Hassan Asif, who is holding additional charge of information secretary, has reportedly been asked to hold a meeting on Friday to assess the controversial transfer of three trusts’ land to the Tehrik-i-Karkunaan-i-Pakistan.The issue has already led to the removal of Mr Oriya Maqbool Jan from the post of the information secretary because he had objected to the transfer on legal grounds. Mr Jan is now reportedly going to the federal government.

According to official sources, the acting information secretary has asked Majlis Taraqi-i-Adab Director Shahzad Ahmad, a renowned poet, and officials of the board of revenue to assess transfer of the land on the direction of the authorities concerned at a meeting at 8.30am on Friday.

Mr Jan had objected to the proposed transfer of eight kanals of the Institute of Islamic Culture, the Bazm-i-Iqbal and the Majlis Taraqi-i-Adab to the Tehrik-i-Karkunan-i-Pakistan.

According to a summary sent by him, the settlement department had allotted eight acres of the Nirsingh Das Villa land on The Mall to the three trusts on Oct 23, 1959 mentioning that this could not be transferred or sold to anyone under the Compensation and Rehabilitation Act 1958.

It would be illegal to transfer the land to the Tehrik-i-Karkunan-i-Pakistan Trust, Mr Jan had mentioned before he was made an OSD.

The summary further said the then chief minister, Ghulam Haider Wyne had in 1992 announced transfer of the three trusts’ two kanals to the Nazaria-i-Pakistan Trust but the then Majlis Taraqi-i-Adab chairman, Ahmad Nadeem Qasmi had refused to agree to the mutation on the same ground that the land could not be transferred or sold to anyone.

And despite the fact that the land was still the property of the three trusts, the building of the Nazaria-i-Pakistan Trust had been built over its six kanals. This was in addition to a mosque built over another kanal of land, according to the summary.