Home Department gets approval for Rs5.5m retainer. PHOTO: FILE
The government has hired Advocate Khawaja Haris to plead its case in the writ petition Kabir A Sheikh vs Islamic Republic of Pakistan regarding the ownership of three properties claimed by Freemasons.
A chief minister’s secretariat official speaking on a condition of anonymity said that the chief minister had approved a summary sent by the Home Department to engage Haris for a fee of Rs5.5 million.
In 1995, Kabir A Sheikh and five others had filed a writ petition stating that they were members of a philanthropist organisation, Free Masons. They owned the properties 90-The Mall, now the chief minister’s secretariat, 307 Sher Shah Road in Multan and 307-Hyder Road in Rawalpindi. The petitioners claimed that the federal and provincial governments had illegally occupied the buildings. They claimed that they owned 30 properties in Pakistan at the time of independence in 1947. The petition is being heard by the Supreme Court of Pakistan.
The Home Department sent the chief minister a summary in the second week of March suggesting a panel of prominent attorneys, Ahstar Osaf, Khawaja Muhammad Haris and Muhammad Kamal, to approve one of them to represent the provincial government in the petition. The Home Department had initially proposed a Rs2.2 million fee for Osaf and Rs3.3 million for Haris. No fee was mentioned for Kamal.
The chief minister approved Haris’s name, but the lawyer demanded Rs5.5 million. The Home Department then sent another summary requesting the chief minister to approve his hiring for Rs5.5 million. The Finance Department was then directed to provide the Home Department Rs5.5 million as a supplementary grant to be paid to the counsel, the official said.
Currently, 90 The Mall houses the chief minister’s secretariat. The Sher Shah Road property has been transferred to the Multan Cantonment Board and the property in Rawalpindi houses the headquarters of Askari Bank.
Interestingly though, revenue records dating back to the 1950s and 1960s show that the building now referred to as 90-The Mall was previously known as Kothi Jadugar (Sorcerer’s House).
Freemasons were banned in Pakistan under the Martial Law Regulation (MLR) 56 in 1983, charging them with “anti-state” and “anti-Islam” activities and handing over their moveable and immoveable assets to provincial governments with immediate effect.
During the course of the case, the Ministry of Interior filed comments stating that freemasons were involved in “anti-state” and “anti-Islam” activities. To this, the freemasons submitted an affidavit declaring that they practiced Islam as a religion.
Home Department Secretary Azam Suleman said there was a provision to hire private counsel with the chief minister’s approval. The selection and fee was decided based on the importance of the case, Suleman said.
Published in The Express Tribune, April 17th, 2014.
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