KARACHI: The Sindh High Court on Tuesday said that its earlier interim restraining order for the Defence Housing Authority (DHA) from reclaiming further land from the shore and granting such land to anyone as well as creating a third-party interest would continue till Dec 1.

When a single-judge bench headed by Justice Zulfiqar Ahmad Khan took up the matter for hearing again, some lawyers filed vakalatnama (power of attorney) for the DHA and other defendants and sought time to file comments.

The bench noted that in compliance to its last order, certain actions had been done by the official assignee, but the report had not been filed.

None was present on behalf of the Karachi Urban Lab (KUL) or National Institute of Oceanography Pakistan (NIOP) and the bench issued them notices directly for the next hearing.

The counsel for plaintiffs submitted that the defendants were not complying with the Oct 13 order of the bench while the lawyers representing various defendants asserted that the order had been fully complied with and no violation was committed.

The bench said that such contentions and response be filed in writing before the next hearing so an appropriate order would be passed.

While adjourning the mater till Dec 1, the bench said that notices be repeated to un-served defendants and the interim order passed on the last hearing to continue till the next hearing.

On Oct 23, the bench had directed the DHA and other official defendants to ensure that the land earlier sanctioned to them as public spaces was not used for any commercial and gainful purposes and ordered the official assignee to inspect the reclaimed land being used by the DHA and furnish a report with photographs and maps of the land with the assistance of KUL or NIOP.

A suit was filed by six plaintiffs who approached the court under the Whistleblower Protection and Vigilance Commission Ordinance 2019 contending that reclaimed land was being misused while the land meant for cantonment purposes was also being used for commercial and gainful purposes.

The lawyers for the plaintiffs argued that recently 22 private defendants in collusion with official defendants had illegally obtained the reclaimed land and the land meant for defence purposes without open auction.

Published in Dawn, November 17th, 2021