NO. They can't. Corruption persists.

While no one in the city of Karachi can deny that the Karachi Building Control Authority (KBCA) of the Karachi Development Authority (KDA) is riddled with graft (the governor's Dissolution Order of 1996 conferred upon it the title of 'Nest of Corruption'), it seems that it is virtually impossible for the government to identify the bad elements in the organization and to take action against them.

In 1995, the citizens of Karachi, helped by Shehri, the environmental watchdog group, stepped up their campaign against the proliferation of illegal buildings that was slowly destroying the quality of life in the metropolis, particularly that of the inner city. The government and the KBCA, during that year and in 1996, were compelled by public pressure to seal some 260-odd unauthorized structures, carry out minor cosmetic demolition, and initiate disciplinary action against 29 KBCA officers who had colluded with the highly corrupt builders' mafia.

In January 1997, an inquiry into the conduct of these 29 officers was conducted by secretary, housing & town planning, Nur Ahmad Shah, one of our rare honest and fearless bureaucrats. He exonerated 14 of them, and recommended major penalties against: Akhtar Iqbal Usmani, Zaidiul Wasti, Rauf Akhtar Faruqui, Iqbal Aziz, Kazi Mumtaz Iqbal, Arshad Jamal, Sultan Mohammad Zuberi, Mohammad Bux Qasmi, Anwar Kamal Kazmi, Khwaja Badi-uz-Zaman, Munawar Azam, Mohammad Ali Qaimkhani, Iqbal-ur-Rahman, Abdul Waheed and Abdul Sattar Pasha. These 15 were charged and suspended.

In 1996, to block their dismissal from service, the 15 filed a suit in the High Court of Sindh, pleading 'political victimization'. By an interim order the single bench of the court reinstated them, pending the outcome of the case. One amongst them, Rauf Akhtar Faruqui, a favourite of many a politician of many a political party, not only survived multiple changes of government but grew in stature with each change. His rise from assitant controller to deputy controller to controller and finally to the plum post of chief controller of Buildings, KBCA, was, as they say, 'meteoric'. It was during his tenure as CCOB that many unlawful approvals were given, inter alia, to Glass Towers (a portion of which was later demolished on the orders of the Supreme Court) and Saima Trade Towers (against which litigation is pending). Faruqui later rose to be director-general of the Malir Development Authority.

The High Court dismissed the suit, declared that the court had no jurisdiction, and directed the plaintiffs to approach the Services Tribunal. They did not do so, but instead appealed to a double bench of the SHC which upheld the decision of the single bench. Undeterred, they filed a petition for leave to appeal in the Supreme Court. In the year 2000, the Supreme Court dismissed the petition. Leave was not granted.

No one will be surprised, and certainly not shocked, to learn that these 15 servants of the public are still on the payroll of the KBCA and that we are paying their salaries. What can also not surprise any citizen of this country is that now, at this late stage, the Sindh department of housing and town planning wishes to exonerate these men, using one excuse or another. What is surprising is that the military government-posted Brigadier Zaheer Kadri, director-general of the KDA, and Brigadier Zafar Malik, chief controller of the KBCA, are both supporting the department's move. But then, who is motivating the department?

At the tail-end of the meeting of the governing body of the KDA held this August 9, without any notice, a 37-page dossier was presented to the members by DG-KDA Brigadier Kadri. The DG, who is also the chief executive of the KBCA, has stated : "The case of the exoneration of the 15 officers has been taken up in the backdrop of the housing and town planning department's letter No.SO(G)/HTP/4-5/197 dated 8/6/ 2001 which has provided clear guidelines for processing the case" [it does nothing of the sort]. The governing body members were further informed: "Points for decision. In the light of above paras, the Governing Body is requested to kindly consider to exonerate 15 officers from the allegations/charges together with reinstatement of eight officers and set aside the inquiry report."

The governing body decided not to follow the DG's recommendations. "No," they emphasized. According to press reports, our Karachi Nazim, Naimatullah Khan, is to now be the chairman of the governing body. Heaven alone knows, what this devolution plan has thrown up for us.

Moving on to the draft of the governor's ordinance to regularize 260-plus unauthorized and/or illegal buildings, a meeting was called by Housing and Town Planning Minister Dewan Mohammad Yusuf on August 17, at which the builders' mafia and the Association of Builders and Developers (together with their "supporters") were fully represented. None of these worthies could give any explanation as to why they, in collusion with the corrupt officers of the KDA and KBCA, had purposefully, deliberately and grossly violated the building code, building in some cases as much as 200,000 sq.ft. in excess of what is permissible.

On this issue, the legal member of the oversee committee of the KBCA, Barrister Qazi Faez Issa, has given his opinion which was published in this newspaper on August 17. The general public and the country's president and chief executive, from whose shoulder the gun is being fired, should read this carefully.

In neighbouring India, in the city of Trivandrum, which has been Indianized and is now simply and briefly known as Thiruvananthapuram, the hometown of my late lamented friend Girjaramprabhushankar Vitianandashivaramakrishna, the 'Regularization of Unpermitted Constructions and Deviations' recently cropped up. In Kerala, officials do not use their kidneys as brains, and the following was ruled:

"(143) Power of the secretary to regularize certain constructions: The secretary shall have the power to regularize construction or reconstruction or addition or alteration of any building or digging of any well commenced, being carried on or completed without obtaining approved plan or in deviation of the approved plan. Provided that such construction or reconstruction or addition or alteration of any building or digging of any well shall not be in violation of any of the provisions of the Act or these rules.

"(144) Submission of application and procedure for its disposal : (1) Application for regularization shall be submitted in the form in Appendix A. (2) The application for regularization shall be accompanied by documentary evidence of ownership of plot, site plan, elevation, building plan, service plan, parking plan wherever the building requires parking, and other details and specifications as are necessary in the case of an application for new building permit; in the case of deviation from approved plan, the approved plan and permit already obtained shall also be submitted. (3) The procedure for disposal of an application for regularization shall be that followed in the case of an application for new permit.

"(145) Application fee : The application fee shall by as specified in Schedule I.

"(146) Decision to be intimated : (1) The secretary shall by written order either grant or refuse to grant regularization. (2) The secretary shall, if the decision is to grant regularization, intimate the fact to the applicant in writing specifying the amount to be remitted as compounding fee and the period within which the amount has to be remitted. (3) The secretary shall, on receipt of the compounding fee, and compliance of the condition, if any specified, issue order as in Appendix - I absolving the person from all liabilities and regularizing the construction, and record the details thereof in a register to be kept as a permanent document in the form in Appendix - J. (4) The compounding fee shall be equal to permit fee specified in Schedule II plus fifty per cent of that amount. (5) The secretary shall, if the decision is to refuse regularization, intimate the fact to the applicant specifying the reasons for such refusal and the period within which such building or part of building has to be demolished or the well filled up:

"Provided that an application for regularization shall be refused only on such grounds on which approval of site or permission to construct or reconstruct a building or well may be refused.

"(147) Demolition of buildings not regularized: (1) Where the owner fails to demolish the building or part thereof or fill up the well as directed in the order refusing regularization or fails to remit the compounding fee within the time specified, or fails to comply with any condition stipulated in the order granting regularization within the time specified, the secretary may himself cause the building or part of thereof demolished or the well filled up as the case may be, and the expenses therefore shall be recovered from the owner as if it were an arrear of property tax due under the Act. Provided that in the case of an order refusing regularization, the building or part thereof shall not be demolished or the well filled up or prosecution initiated as in sub rule (2) until and unless the time prescribed for filing an appeal from such an order has not expired. (2) Not withstanding anything contained in sub-rule (1), the secretary may also take prosecution proceedings against the owner."

The law-makers and ordinance-drafters of Pakistan should note the preamble "provided that such construction or reconstruction or addition or alteration of any building or digging of any well shall not be [repeat, shall not be] in violation of any of the provisions of the [relevant] Act or these rules." The law was upheld.