PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court on Wednesday directed the finance and communication and works departments to arrange funds to build a wall around the University of Peshawar’s botanical garden in Azakhel area of Nowshera district.

It also directed Nowshera’s additional deputy commissioner and other relevant officers to visit the site for the early start of work.

The directions were issued by a bench consisting of Chief Justice Qaiser Rashid Khan and Justice Abdul Shakoor during a hearing into a petition of the UoP syndicate against the Feb 3, 2016, orders by the Nowshera district nazim to cancel the lease of 567 kanals of land.

During the last hearings, the court had ordered the district administration to hand over the ‘possession’ of land to the university.

Nowshera admin says land handed over to UoP

Advocates Abdul Samad Khan and Waseemuddin Khattak represented the syndicate and the vice-chancellor respectively during the hearing, where director of the botanical garden Dr Asadullah, UoP Vice-Chancellor Dr Mohammad Idress, additional deputy commissioner Quratul Aeen Wazir, senior prosecutor of the National Accountability Bureau Mohammad Ali, additional advocate general Qaiser Ali Shah and UoP director (legal) Riaz Ali Khan were also in attendance.

The bench was informed that the possession of the botanical garden’s land in question had been handed over to the university, but the boundary wall was not intact.

The chief justice declared that as the boundary wall was demolished by the district administration and the government, it was their responsibility to reconstruct it.

ADC Quratul Aeen Wazir assured the bench that she would visit the area along with relevant officers and would submit a report to the court about it.

During hearing, the chief justice expressed concern about the poor condition of the university’s Summer Camp in Baragali, Abbottabad, and asked the VC why tree plantation wasn’t carried out there.

He observed that the administration had left the entire plantation on campus to the nature.

The VC insisted that plantation campaigns were carried out in the Summer Camp twice a year but most plants were damaged by monkeys living in those areas in large numbers.

The bench observed that the university had gardeners, so they should be tasked with looking after plants at the Summer Camp.

On Feb 24, 2014, the then chief minister, Pervez Khattak, had ordered the provision of around 500 kanals of the botanical garden’s land for the establishment of the campuses of the Air University and Technical University. However, the high court had declared the order illegal on June 9, 2014.

The then Nowshera nazim, Liaquat Khattak, who is the brother of Mr Khattak, later ordered cancellation of the lease of land measuring 567 kanals.

The petitioners had said that the UoP’s syndicate had approved the establishment of the Centre of Plant Biodiversity in Dec 2003 and that included the establishment of a botanical garden in Azakhel area of Nowshera for which the district administration had leased out 689 kanals of land for 99 years in 2005.

They said that almost all plants in the botanical garden were destroyed, while the people had taken away doors and windows from the structure, so the district administration had taken over the land.

Published in Dawn, September 29th, 2022