KOHAT: An embezzlement of Rs9 million has been unearthed in the construction of the yet-to-complete Ahmed Faraz Park here.

The construction work had been stopped in 2014 after the groundbreaking was performed by then governor and brother of Ahmed Faraz, Barrister Syed Masud Kausar in 2013 in Jarma area on the University Road. The governor had released initial grant of Rs58 million for it.

Sources said the tehsil municipal administration had awarded the contract to a company whose contractor ran away after a year leaving the work incomplete.

An official confided to Dawn on condition of anonymity that the contractor was paid the security money despite the fact that he left the work incomplete. He said no inquiry had been launched to recover the money from the contractor, adding despite several visits and directives issued by Senator Shibli Faraz, the son of Ahmed Faraz, to get the work resumed on the park, no headway had been made in the matter.

The official said several executive engineers of the relevant department, who were tasked with executing the project, failed to get it complete in their respective stints, and were allegedly involved in fund embezzlement.

This correspondent attempted several times to contact Laal Ghaffar, the relevant engineer, for his version on the project, but he did not pick the phone.

Last week, assistant commissioner Captain retired Abdur Rehman had ordered an inquiry into the case, and asked the TMA officials to submit all the details of expenditure in three days. But despite lapse of seven days, the municipal officials were still making lame excuses that the contractor suffered a huge loss because the park was to be constructed on a hard mountain.

They, however, could not justify payment of the security money to the contractor. They said it was shut case because the officials concerned had retired and work could not be restarted due to shortage of funds with TMA. The officials said that boundary wall and few rooms had already been constructed there.

Published in Dawn, December 31st, 2018