KARACHI: The Sindh High Court on Tuesday confirmed the interim bail granted to provincial land utilisation secretary Aftab Ahmed Memon, former Karachi administrator Rauf Akhtar Farooqui, secretary of Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Institute of Science and Technology’s (SZABIST) board of trustees Dr Salman Shah and other officials in the case pertaining to illegal allotment of land.

Headed by Chief Justice Ahmed Ali M. Shaikh, a two-judge bench was hearing pleas filed by the above-mentioned officials who had moved the court after the National Accountability Bureau filed the corruption reference against them.

According to NAB, the accused persons in connivance with each other had caused loss of millions of rupees to the national exchequer through “illegal” allotment of five acres of land to SZABIST.

During the hearing, advocates Shabeeh Ishrat Hussain and Dr Faiz H.I. Shah, representing the accused persons, denied the charges and termed the charges labelled against their clients baseless.

Advocate Hussain, appearing for Rauf Akhtar Farooqui, argued that his client was not serving as the city administrator at the time of said allotment.

He said that Mr Farooqui had taken the charge after that and neither signed the summary for allotment nor the allotment order.

The counsel for other petitioners also took similar pleas contending no loss occurred to the exchequer nor any benefit accrued to any accused because the allotment in question was revoked by the government.

They contended that their names had been included in the references with mala fide intentions.

‘Excessive’ billing case

Another bench of the high court directed K-Electric to file comments on the petitions filed by citizens against alleged highly exaggerated, erroneous and excessive billing.

The bench was hearing different petitions of Daniyal, Saad and Arsalan against “excessive” billing by the power utility. The petitioners alleged that the electricity provider was sending “excessive” bills and “harassing” them in case of non-payment.

They told the judges that the KE used to charge highly exaggerated bills from the citizens and threaten to disconnect electricity if they refused to pay excessive bills.

The petitioners maintained that KE had accused them of metre tampering with mala fide intentions.

The lawyer representing the petitioners prayed to the court to direct the electricity provider to withdraw the excessive bills and not to disconnect the electricity of the petitioners.

The court issued notice to KE administrator and sought their reply by March 29.

Published in Dawn, March 28th, 2018