ISLAMABAD, Feb 7: The Lahore High Court (LHC), Rawalpindi Bench, on Tuesday directed the Federal Government Employees Housing Foundation (FGEHF) to cancel the plots allotted to the employees of Pakistan Television (PTV) Corporation and Associated Press of Pakistan (APP) Corporation under journalists’ quota in Sector G-14.

The court accepted the plea of some journalists, Rana Qaisar, Khalid Qayum, Sohail Abdul Nasir, Siddique Sajid, Nazir Aulak, Khalid Mehmood and Zeeshan Haider, who had challenged the government decision to allot residential plots from journalists’ quota to the PTV and APP employees, who already had eight per cent quota in the sector.

Justice Ali Nawaz Chohan observed that the employees of the two corporations did not fall in the category of journalists, and since they had their separate quotas in FGEHF’s schemes, they could not get plots under the three per cent journalists’ quota.

Justice Ali Nawaz Chohan also dismissed a writ petition of the PTV employees that private sector journalists were not eligible for residential plots in G-14.

Earlier, Advocate Jamila Aslam, who was representing the petitioners, informed the court that the exclusive rights of the journalists reserved in the FGEHF scheme were encroached upon by the employees of the two corporations.

She said separate quotas were reserved for the employees of the corporations and the journalists. She informed the court that the FGEHF had issued the allotment letters on the recommendations of the Information Ministry.

Justice Chohan observed that the Information Ministry had no right to exercise its discretion. He ordered the FGEHF to ensure that all irregularities were removed within 15 days.