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KARACHI, May 29: The Sindh High Court indicted Director-General Afsar Din Talpur of the Port Qasim Authority (PQA) for contempt and restrained the authority from dealing with a plot re-allotted despite a stay order.
A private company submitted through Advocate Khalid Jawed Khan that it was allotted a five-acre plot for container terminal at the PQA.
It deposited Rs3.35 million as development charges but its allotment was cancelled for non-payment of the balance. He approached the high court, which asked him to pay off the remaining Rs3.75 million and restrained the authority from creating third party interest in the plot. However, the plot was re-allotted to another company owned by Fakhre Alam, son of PQA Director-General Ejaz Alam.
The plaintiff sued the PQA authorities for contempt and Justice Amir Hani Muslim, who was seized of the case, called for DG Afsar Din Talpur’s comments. The DG said he was wrongly advised by his lawyer about the implications of the court order.
The judge said the DG had failed to purge himself of contempt committed by him by willfully defying a court order, framed the charge and asked a federal government counsel to prosecute the contempt case. August 13 was fixed as the date of hearing. The PQA was restrained from dealing with the plot in the meantime.
Arguing another allottee’s case, Advocate Khalid Javed said the commercial and industrial plots in the authority were meant for promotion of exports but were being doled out to favorites and relatives. Allotment orders were not put up before the PQA board of directors to avoid scrutiny. Two plots, he alleged, had been leased out to Mr Talpur’s son.
PLOT OCCUPIED: A division bench comprising Justices Sarmad Jalal Osmany and Ali Sain Dino Metlo asked the court nazir to inspect plot 17-C in Block 6 of Gulistan-i-Jauhar (Scheme 36) to resolve a dispute about its ownership. Petitioner Talat Ejaz said the 600-square-yard plot was allotted to him but the city district government had failed to deliver him its possession.
CDGK counsel Manzoor Ahmed confirmed the petitioner’s claim but said the possession could not be delivered because the plot had meanwhile been illegally occupied. He said it was one of the 404 plots developed by the CDGK on 30 acres of additional land acquired by it in Scheme 36.
The occupants, builders and developers, submitted that the plot and adjacent land was part of a suburban settlement or ‘goth’ and had been purchased by them directly from the villagers. They replied in the negative when asked whether the ‘goth’ graveyard had also been sold to them. The bench asked the nazir to visit the site and adjourned further hearing.
LOAD-SHEDDING: Another division bench consisting of Chief Justice Sabihuddin Ahmed and Justice Gulzar Ahmed asked the Karachi Electricity Supply Corporation to submit its comments on a petition agitating frequent power breakdowns and load-shedding by June 5.
Petitioner-lawyer Iqbal Kazmi said the new owners of the corporation were to invest additional amounts to improve its infrastructure but had failed to do so and their failure was the main reason behind power shut-downs.
