Rawalpindi: Auctioning of Railways’ land leased to college stayed

[Naveed Yaseen]

Faisal Kamal Pasha
Justice Tariq Shamim of the Lahore High Court (LHC) Rawalpindi bench here on Wednesday stopped Pakistan Railways from auctioning a piece of land leased out for the construction of a degree college of women and directed the department to submit its comments till June 8.

The LHC bench while admitting the petition of former federal minister Sheikh Rasheed Ahmed directed the Railways authorities not to sell the land in the auction till the final disposal of the petition.

Law officer of Pakistan Railways told the court that the lease of the land was based on a letter issued by divisional superintendent and the letter would be cancelled by the department.

The petitioner, however, contended that the lease was granted by the Railways board in a meeting of its executive body meeting in Lahore 2007.

Nominating Pakistan Railways, its director lands and Ministry of Housing and Works as respondents former MNA through his legal counsel Muhammad Ilyas Sheikh has challenged the decision of executive committee of Railway board to auction the piece of land near old Railway Police Station in Saddar.

In another case Justice Imtiaz Rasheed Siddiqi decided to take up the petitions of Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) Rawalpindi-Islamabad Chapter against Ministry of Health and National Institute of Health (NIH) and an application of the health ministry on May 12.

The PMA has moved a contempt of court petition against the ministry for procuring different kinds of vaccines without properly advertising the demand despite the fact that they had assured the court to follow the procurement rules while buying the vaccines.

The ministry has moved an application seeking transfer of the case to the Islamabad High Court as the LHC lacked the jurisdiction to decide the matter.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=176292