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ISLAMABAD: While the government sits on recommendations of a special parliamentary committee against people who inflicted losses of billions of rupees on Pakistan Railways in a fraudulent land deal, behind the scene efforts are being made to revise the agreement and let the three accused retired generals off the hook.
In 2001, the railways leased out 141 acres of its land at a prime location in Lahore to owners of the Royal Palm and Country Club. Later, media reports said the deal hadn’t been made by fair means.
When the current government came to power, it decided to carry out a thorough inquiry through the special parliamentary committee.
Sources at the railways headquarters told Dawn that since the case had been sent to the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) to further investigate the matter, some well-connected people were working as go-between to persuade the department’s bosses and the lessee to revise the agreement and give it a legal cover.
When contacted, Railway General Manager (Operations) Saeed Akhtar said he didn’t know about any re-negotiation with the club’s owners.
The sources said the parliamentary committee had called for cancelling the deal and re-auctioning the land. However, there were indications that the lessee may keep the land with some changes made in the original deal, the sources said.
They said that after the involvement of the bureau there were chances the new deal would be covered under the plea-bargain clause of the NAB Ordinance.
National Assembly Speaker, Dr Fehmida Mirza, constituted the 20-member special committee on April 22, 2008, to investigate the lease.
The committee headed by Nadeem Afzal Gondal of the PPP held over 20 meetings and presented its report in the first week of October 2010, coming up with some strong recommendations.
The committee is reported to have found the then railways minister and outgoing PML-Q Senator Lt-Gen (retd) Javed Ashraf Qazi, along with former secretary and chairman of the organisation Lt-Gen Saeeduz Zafar, ex-general manager Maj-Gen Hamid Hassan Butt and former secretary Khursheed Alam Khan, responsible for the dubious deal.
According the committee, the railways suffered a staggering Rs25 billion loss as result of the deal.
It asked the government to register criminal cases against all concerned and confiscate and auction their property to recover the loss.
The report has never been taken up for discussion in the house. There are allegations that the decision not to take up the report was taken after the PML-Q had joined the ruling coalition.
In October last year, the Supreme Court took suo motu notice when a railways pensioner died while waiting outside a bank to receive his monthly pension. Later the SC expanded the scope of its notice and also sought reports on the organisations' messy affairs.
