WITH a sum as stupendous as Rs460bn — nearly $3bn — at stake, no wonder there is a tussle over it. The amount, of course, is what the Supreme Court had two years ago determined Bahria Town should pay in land settlement dues for tens of thousands of acres it had fraudulently acquired in Karachi’s Malir district. On Tuesday, the federal government suggested before the apex court that a high-powered committee be formed to oversee how the money is utilised. Initially, it had contended that it had the right to any funds deposited in the Supreme Court regardless of the purpose for which they were obtained or deposited. The Sindh government, on the other hand, citing a severe financial crunch and the shortfall in federal revenue due to it, argued its claim to the settlement dues. While the centre has since conceded the right of Sindh to the Rs460bn, it appears determined to have a mechanism put in place to oversee that these funds are spent ‘equitably’ and ‘transparently’. However, according to the Sindh advocate general, the provincial government is chary of any mechanism that would allow the centre to dictate which development projects could be funded with the money.

Frankly, neither side has any claim to integrity where Bahria Town is concerned. The Supreme Court’s damning judgement of May 4, 2018 found Sindh government functionaries wholly complicit in handing over huge tracts of Karachi’s real estate to Bahria for its housing project on the city’s outskirts. The collusion was well-thought-out and brazen in scope. It involved, among other actions, forgery of documents, manifestly dishonest interpretation of relevant rules, and even legislative jugglery to circumvent a Supreme Court order. As for the PTI government, usually so strident about accountability, it appears to have quietly allowed £190m recovered by the UK’s National Crime Agency from Malik Riaz — money “suspected to have derived from bribery and corruption overseas” — to go towards the payment of Rs460bn in settlement dues. In short, this is yet another instance where the long arm of the law seems inexplicably unable to bring Bahria’s owner to account. That said, the federal government’s proposal that a former apex court judge from Sindh head the above-mentioned committee is a sound one. The settlement dues must be judiciously spent for the benefit of the people of Sindh, and those who have suffered at Bahria’s hands. They must not end up enriching corrupt elites.

Published in Dawn, March 13th, 2020