ISLAMABAD – In its drive to weed out corruption and recover the embezzled money, the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has filed a corruption reference against those involved in the illegal award of lease of Railways Golf Club, Lahore.
According to a communique issued by the accountability watchdog, the reference has been filed in the Islamabad Accountability Court against accused Lt Gen (retd) Javed Ashraf Qazi who has served as former secretary/chairman Railways, Director General Inter-Services Intelligence and as a federal minister for communication and Railways.
Other accused in the case include military gunslingers who have served in pivotal positions in the armed forces – former secretary/chairman Railways Board, Lt Gen (retd) Saeed-uz-Zaman, Maj Gen (retd) Hamid Hassan Butt, Brig (retd) Akhtar Ali Baig – Mr Iqbal Samad Khan, Khurshid Ahmed Khan, Abdul Ghaffar, Ramzan Sheikh, Pervaiz Qureshi, sponsors of Royal Palm Golf Club and five other officials.
The press release adds that in the year 2001, Pakistan Railway offered the lease of its Golf Club at canal bank Lahore for 33 years for which a number of firms furnished bids including MAX Corps Pvt Ltd.
‘During the bidding process, the lease period was illegally enhanced from 33 years to 49 years,’ claimed the graft-buster.
Moreover, the land offered for lease was also increased illegally from 103 Acers to 140 Acers by razing the Railway officer colony to the ground.
“Hence the precious piece of land of Pakistan Railway was leased out illegally in a nontransparent manner in order to grant illegal benefits to the leaseholder that is Main Land Hasnain ltd,” the press release continued.
The country’s apex anti-corruption organization asserted it has been established during the investigation that the accused committed the offence of corruption / corrupt practices through misuse of authority by the illegal award of 49 years lease of Railway Golf Club Lahore measuring 140 acres in 2001 to M/s Mainland Hasnain Pakistan Ltd (MHPL) for commercial purposes.
“The deal caused a loss of Rs 2.2 billion (approx) to the National Exchequer.” concluded the statement issued by the National Accountability Bureau, currently headed by Justice (r) Javed Iqbal.
Proceedings Against Javed Ashraf Qazi
Lt Gen Qazi was summoned by NAB in the same Royal Palm Golf and Country Club case in 2012 but nothing was done against them.
The Public Accounts Committee of the National Assembly had on Sept 14, 2012 called for cancelling the controversial agreement, holding a fresh bidding for the land and taking strict disciplinary action against the former bosses of railways, including the retired generals, who ratified the agreement.
