A sweet gesture: When Elahi became Sharifs’ benefactor

PTI President Parvez Elahi has turned out to be a benefactor of the Sharifs, as thanks to a piece of legislation that the Punjab Assembly passed during Elahi’s term as the provincial chief minister in November 2022, the PML-N’s top leaders are now able to reactivate three of their sugar mills in South Punjab.

In October 2016, Justice Ayesha Malik, then a Lahore High Court judge, had prevented then prime minister Nawaz Sharif and his brother, then Punjab chief minister Shehbaz Sharif, from relocating three of their sugar mills to South Punjab.

Justice Ayesha had issued this order while hearing some petitions including one filed by sugar baron Jahangir Khan Tareen, then a PTI leader.

These mills—Ittefaq Sugar Mills, Haseeb Waqas Sugar Mills, and Chaudhry Sugar Mills—were respectively transferred from North Punjab to Bahawalpur, Muzaffargarh, and Rahim Yar Khan.

The Sharifs appealed against the LHC's decision to the Supreme Court which in 2018 issued an order to immediately relocate the mills to their original locations, while dismissing their appeals.

However, during his term as Punjab chief minister, Parvez Elahi, who is regarded as a longtime rival of the Sharifs, the Punjab Provincial Assembly passed the Punjab Industries (Control on Establishment and Enlargement) Amendment Act, 2022.

The law, enacted on November 14, 2022, following the approval of the Punjab Governor, enabled sugar mills in the province not only to enhance their sugar cane crushing capacity but also legalized their relocation.

Interestingly, when in February this year, the Supreme Court resumed hearing of the review appeals filed by Sharifs against the SC's 2018 verdict, the caretaker Punjab government and Tareen told the court that they wanted to withdraw their petitions.

The three-member bench, consisting of Justice Ijazul Ahsan, Justice Munib Akhtar, and Justice Sayyed Mazahar Ali Akbar Naqvi, had expressed annoyance at this change of hearts.

At the hearing, the Punjab Industries and Commerce Department had told the court that the issue of the relocation of the sugar mills had been resolved after the Punjab Assembly’s legislation.

So now when Parvez Elahi is facing a storm in the shape of dozens of legal cases, his rivals are reaping the benefit of a piece of legislation passed during his term by reactivating their sugar mills.

Chaudhry Sugar Mills, Haseeb Waqas Sugar Mills and Ittefaq Sugar Mills are all set to kick off crushing and  their boilers have been fired up for the crushing test after  two to three days of cleaning and maintenance.

In 2005, the Punjab government had imposed legal restrictions on the cultivation of sugarcane in certain districts where cotton was the main crop.

However, cotton production has reduced from 14 million bales in 2005 to 5 million bales in 2023 due to the increase in the number of sugar mills in Southern Punjab.

This year, there has been an overall increase in cotton cultivation and production in Punjab.

According to the government, there has been a 70% increase in cotton production in 2023. However, this is still 65% lower compared to the levels in 2005. Currently, cotton cultivation is only done on around 900,000 acres in the Rahim Yar Khan district.

The commencement of sugarcane cultivation by three more sugar mills will have a significant impact on cotton and wheat cultivation.

Sugar mafia

The reality is that Pakistan's sugar industry is possibly the most powerful and influential lobby in the country. Almost all of the country's 91 sugar mills are owned by prominent politicians and their families.

For the past six years, this powerful and influential lobby had been engaged in internal battles due to political reasons. However, a lot has changed in the past year.

The PTI has largely disintegrated and the alliance of the PPP and PML-N signifies that where the sugar lobby was once divided due to politics, it has now united once again due to politics.