LAHORE, Nov 27: The Lahore High Court on Thursday asked the secretary colonies to explain as to why 14 shops adjacent to a graveyard wall were not leased out despite court orders.

Justice Ali Akbar Qureshi also sought a detailed report till Dec 5 from the secretary colonies about new encroachments on the Miani Sahib graveyard land. He also directed the secretary to come up on the next date of hearing with a report regarding demarcation of the graveyard land.

The judge issued these directions when Miani Sahib Graveyard Committee (MSGC) complained that a park namely Aslam Hayat Park had been established after encroaching the graveyard land.

The committee also pointed out that the government had not yet leased out 14 shops owned by the graveyard despite court orders.

Meanwhile, a court-appointed charted accountant company informed the judge on Thursday that a three-year audit of MSGC’s accounts had been completed. The court had ordered audit of accounts from 1958 to till date.

Justice Qureshi was hearing a petition filed by Syed Muhammad Shah, challenging the sale of a piece of land of the Miani Sahib graveyard to the LDA.

The petitioner had also moved an application seeking court intervention to conduct audit of MSGC’s accounts that had not been done since its formation in 1958.

Shah pleaded that he had moved an application to the MSGC chairman that the demarcation of land had not been carried out and the land should be mutated in the name of graveyard. But due to some hidden reasons it was not done. The petitioner further sought directions to the member colonies to visit graveyard and get illegal constructions removed from its land.

Stage dances case: A division bench of the Lahore High Court (LHC) is likely to take up on Monday an appeal against the order of Justice Khurshid Anwar Bhinder that banned all dances in stage dramas on Nov 12.

Justice Bhinder had also stopped cable operators from airing dances on the premise that vulgarity and obscenity in these dances had a negative impact on children.

Petitioner drama producer Zaheer Husain Adil, through an intra court appeal, assailed the order of the single bench. He challenged the act of the Punjab Arts Council, which did not allow him a stage drama with songs and dances.

Petitioner’s counsel Imran Aziz pleads that the Nov 12 judgment is in conflict with the earlier judgments of the high court that clearly state that songs and dances in theatrical performances may not be banned completely. He says the government’s appeal against one such permission given by the high court was dismissed in 2003. The petitioner claims the single bench in its Nov 12 order committed a mistake by banning songs and dances from all theatrical performances in the province and also erred by ignoring the fact that the government in its May 17 notification banned the songs/dances only at four theatres.

He says the impugned notification is capricious and against the law laid down by the LHC in a writ petition decided in 2003. He has prayed to the court to set aside the order of the single bench as well as the impugned notification.