Orange Line metro: SC accepts govt’s plea for early hearing

Appeal against verdict to stop work near heritage sites fixed for Sept 26

ISLAMABAD: The top court has accepted Punjab government’s request for an early hearing of the plea to allow resumption of construction on the Orange Line Metro project. The hearing has been fixed for Monday (September 26).

A three-judge apex court bench headed by the chief justice himself will hear four appeals of different departments against the Lahore High Court verdict, which had barred the provincial authorities from carrying out development work within a distance of 200 feet around 10 heritage sites in Lahore.

The Punjab government has engaged top lawyers like Makhdoom Ali Khan, Khawaja Haris and Mustafa Ramday to contest its case before the apex court. Senior counsel Asma Jahangir, Azhar Sadique and Khawaja Ahmad Hassan will defend the LHC’s verdict.

The Lahore Development Authority (LDA) claims that any delay in the completion of the civil works of the Orange Line will not only increase the costs but also delay the entire project.

The application states about Rs26.864 billion of public money already spent on the project would also go waste.

The provincial government has contracts worth Rs45.5 billion with four companies for the civil works of the Orange Line of Lahore’s Metro Train. The execution of works under each of these contracts is time bound.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 24^th, 2016.