LAHORE: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has ordered an inquiry into “reported irregularities” in land acquisition for Diamer-Bhasha Dam by Wapda, and appointed Nargis Sethi, Economic Affairs Division secretary, to conduct the probe.

According to the prime ministerial notification, the probe is to be completed within 15 days and report submitted to the prime minister for further orders. Ms Sethi is reportedly arriving Wapda House on Thursday (today) to initiate the inquiry.

The terms of reference of inquiry ask the inquiry officer to ascertain what average cost per acre for the acquisition is and has it been fairly calculated? What was the original estimate of acquisition and how much funds Wapda has so far been provided with? Have funds given for the project been re-appropriated to other projects. If so, to what extent they were diverted to other schemes and who was responsible for the diversion. What is the present status of land acquisition? How many acres have so far been acquired and how many of them left and what is the financial implication of lands still to be acquired?

According to Wapda insiders, both issues have dogged the project far too long and hindered progress on ground. According to them, the then calculations under Section 4, under which the government acquires land for any project, had indicated a price range of Rs300,000 to Rs500,000 per kanal, which, somehow or other, was later escalated to Rs1 million to Rs1.2m – and is still rising. The new range of price defied the fact that the project was located outside Chilas city – a far-flung and least developed area of the country. The huge escalation, which took the land rates closer to most of urban areas in the country, attracted allegations of wrongdoing in land acquisition by local revenue official, Wapda officers and the Kashmir affairs ministry. They became loud enough to attract the ears of the chief executive of the country, who has now ordered inquiry.

The second point of inquiry, which is fund diversion, has also hurt the project like the first one. During the same time, the authority also allegedly diverted funds allocated for the Diamer-Bhasha project, a top priority dam for the previous as well as the present government, to other projects like the Katchi Canal, Mangla Raising Project and even to the Neelum-Jhelum Hydropower Project. Officially, these funds were given as loans to other projects, but the fact that they hindered progress at the Diamer-Bhasha site and became a drag on this project.