KARACHI: The provincial authorities on Wednesday contended before the Sindh High Court that 34 orphanage homes in the province had so far been registered and the rest would be enlisted within three months.

The provincial law officer made the contention after the SHC had granted a last chance to the social welfare department secretary to ensure that all measures were taken, including coercive actions against such orphanage centres, in order to register them and sought a compliance report.

When the single-judge bench headed by Justice Salahuddin Panhwar took up the matter regarding orphanages in which it had passed several orders in previous hearings regarding orphanage homes, scholarship and guzara allowance cards, the representatives of Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto University of Law Karachi, Jinnah Sindh Medical University, Shah Abdul Latif University, Sindh Agriculture University Tandojam and Benazir Bhutto Shaheed University of Technology and Skill Development Khairpur were in attendance.

They submitted that some of them had partially received zakat amount for scholarships for poor and needy students, but then they got a letter asking the universities that since the year was ending, thus they must return the same and the fund/amount be reallocated in the current financial year.

The bench directed the secretary of religious affairs, zakat and ushr to ensure that the zakat amount allocated for scholarships of underprivileged students must be received by all the universities within 10 days.

The bench also directed the zakat council to examine the issue of reallocation of funds within the spirit of the orders passed by the SHC on different occasions.

The bench in its order said that when the issue of orphanages was deliberated by the bench earlier, certain irregularities and illegalities had surfaced as the funds reserved for endowment funds and meant for scholarships of poor and meritorious students were utilised by high officials of the provincial government for their children studying in foreign countries and private educational institutes through the discretionary power of the chief minister though their cases were rejected by the board/competent authority.

“When this issue was noticed, learned AG [advocate general Sindh] appeared and filed statement that in future chief minister Sindh will not utilise these powers and that amount received by the beneficiaries who were not eligible to receiving it was returned by the government from the other heads, but not within terms of order dated 4.2.2020. Needless to mention that directions were issued that amount shall be recovered as land revenue arrears from the officers and beneficiaries who received the amount beyond the jurisdiction without approval of competent authority”, it added.

Regarding the shelter homes for orphans, the social welfare department undertook that they were going to launch a pilot project in Korangi district while a similar project was functioning in Malir district.

About the registration of orphanages, the AG Sindh contended that over 30 orphanages/institutions had been registered and the remaining would be registered within three months.

Earlier, the same bench had also directed the provincial home department to constitute a joint investigation team to examine the last 10-year record of all the orphanages in the province and conduct a probe into the possibility of human trafficking and organ translocations.

Published in Dawn, September 9th, 2021