PESHAWAR: A Peshawar High Court bench on Thursday issued a stay order suspending an inquiry of the provincial anti-corruption establishment against several village conservation committees of markhor and ibex conservation areas of Chitral district about the utilisiation of their share in the revenue generated by hunting permits.

Justice Mussarat Hilali and Justice Ishtiaq Ibrahim issued the order during a hearing into a petition filed by a dozen of VCCs challenging the inquiry as well as the restrictions placed on them by the wildlife department over the utilisation of their share in community development projects.

The bench fixed July 31 for the next hearing asking the ACE not to take any adverse action against petitioners until then.

VCCs also challenge curbs on share in hunting permit revenue

It also issued notices to the respondents, including the ACE and secretary of the wildlife department, asking them to respond to the plea of the petitioners on the next hearing.

The petitioners requested the court to order the wildlife department to comply with its two relevant notifications and allow them to utilise their exclusive share of 80 per cent revenue generated by hunting permits for markhor and ibex for community development projects.

They requested the court to declare the government’s act of asking them to utilise only interest on that 80 per cent revenue (their share) against the scheme of management and conservation of wildlife through VCCs and fatal to conservation of their natural resources.

The petitioners termed the ACE inquiry interference in the administrative and financial matters of the privately-owned VCCs.

They requested the court to stop the ACE from creating any hurdle to community welfare work through ‘fabricated’ inquiries.

Lawyer for petitioners Syed Ghufranullah Shah said all 12 VCCs were local non-governmental and private committees of 12 villages of markhor and ibex conservation area of Chitral and that they formed a super cluster, Toshi Shasha conservancy area.

He said the government had established the wildlife division in 1975 to mitigate the fatal extinction of wild species through proper scientific management principles, while the community based wildlife conservancy programme was introduced later.

The lawyer said the wildlife department issued a notification on Feb 22, 1997, agreeing to pay 75 per cent share of revenue realised from issuing hunting permits for markhor and ibex in community development projects.

He added that another notification was issued on Jan 12, 2002, increasing that share from 75 per cent to 80 per cent.

The lawyer said VCCs had been utilising that share for community development initiatives while maintaining proper books of accounts to ensure transparency.

He said the ACE had begun illegal inquiry against his clients on the pretext that as per the terms of partnership with the wildlife department, the capital money of the relevant fund would not be utilised by the committees and that only interest on the deposit would be utilised.

The counsel said the two notifications of the wildlife department didn’t place any restriction placed on the utilisation of the VCCs’ share.

Published in Dawn, July 19th, 2019