Islamabad: Hearing into land acquisition case adjourned

[Naveed Yaseen]

ISLAMABAD: A Division Bench of Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Thursday accepted an intra-court appeal (ICA) by the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and the respondent over its single bench’s decision on land acquisition period.

The bench, which consisted of Justice Munir Paracha and Justice Dr Sajid Qureshi, issued notices to both parties and adjourned the hearing intoRaja Safeer Ahmed’s plea against the MoD till June 23.

An IHC single bench, composed of Justice Syed Qalb-e-Hassan, had earlier limited the land acquisition period to three years in a case.

The bench had declared that the notice issued by the competent authority should not be for an indefinite period, which affected land transaction in a particular area. It said that any order passed against land transaction would become ineffective after the lapse of set period.

Lawyer Iftikhar Gillani had maintained that the MoD through a notification had illegally seized around 2,000 acres land near Pakistan Institute of Nuclear Sciences and Technology (PINST) on Lethrar Road. He said that the step was not permissible by the law of the land.

He said that a piece of land could be confiscated only if construction work near a sensitive area hindered in a sensitive installation’s functioning.

He claimed that the step brought down land prices resulting in financial problems for locals.

The counsel for the MoD claimed that the laws were there to acquire public property. They said that equal compensation had been paid to the affected owners after determining its market price.

They said that under Work of Defence Act, 1903, the government could notify issue a notification about acquisition of land falling within the proximity of 2,000 metres of its installations.

The law also permitted that no construction activity should take place in that area without permission from the authorities concerned, they said.

They said that any activity posing security hazards would be stopped under the same law. app

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp...008_pg11_6