PHOTO: FILE
The licence had expired earlier in June.
An official in the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT) administration's Fisheries Department told the media on Tuesday that Younas Enterprises had won the contract for fishing in the lake for two years for Rs44 million through an open auction in December 2016. The administration and the contractor agreed that the latter will pay off the sum of the licence in four equal instalments of Rs11 million each over the duration of the contract, apart from paying other applicable taxes.
The contract was supposed to expire in 2018, however, after mass death of fish in the lake in 2017, the deputy commissioner’s office was asked to arbitrate the contract and the company was allowed to continue fishing for another year as compensation, subject to the rules and regulations. However, the official said that the arbitration could not be regularised by a court because of time restrictions and the extension for the contractor could not be formalised.
During this time, the company paid three of the instalments but defaulted on paying the last tranche in the stipulated period.
The official said the department finally terminated the company’ contract in June this year but they continued their fishing activities. As a result, the fisheries department imposed a fine of Rs20 million on the contractor for unlawful fishing.
The contractor, however, challenged the termination of the contract in a civil court and obtained a stay order which remained in effect until July 23, 2019.
With the licence cancelled and the stay from a court vacated, the department recently conducted an operation in the lake against illegal fishing and confiscated the boats, fishing rods and other equipment of the company.
The official said the contractor reacted to this by lodging a First Information Report (FIR) against officials of the fisheries department for allegedly stealing their fishing equipment.
"Our staffers are now afraid of visiting the area after the FIR was registered against them," the official said.
To a question about the fine imposed, the official said that they were in the process of recovering the fine imposed, adding that the department hopes to raise around Rs60 million if the contract is auctioned anew.
Bahadur Sher Afridi from the contracting company said that they suffered losses worth an estimated Rs130 million due to the mass fish deaths in 2017. He blamed the death of fish on the poisoning of the lake’s waters by locals.
The ICT administration, he claimed, had formed a committee to redress their grievances and it agreed to extend the contract for another year in lieu of the compensation awarded by the deputy commissioner’s office.
Afridi added that with permission from the fishing department, they had reared some fish in the lake but their contract was abruptly terminated in June.
Meanwhile, locals have approached the Supreme Court of Pakistan over the continuous, allegedly illegal fishing in Rawal Lake, by the contractor despite the expiry of his contract. They contended that the practice was being carried out in connivance with the department concerned.
Locals also blamed the mass death of fish a few years ago on the over-fish ‘seeding’ n the lake which reduced the oxygen levels in the water, resulting in the dead fish. They also refuted the contractor's accusation of poisoning water.
Raja Mudassar, who is one of the petitioners, said they had withdrawn the petition after the Fisheries Department assured the court that fishing will not be allowed in the lake by anyone without a legal permit.
He, however, blamed the department for confiscating their sight-seeing boats during over the past two months which affected their daily earning at Lake View Park.
Published in The Express Tribune, November 27th, 2019.
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