Trust tug-of-war reaches court

SHC orders 30-day probe into Kaimkhani Trust's control, governance, finances

HYDERABAD:

The dispute between two groups of people to wrest administrative control of Kaimkhani Education Trust, which has been operating big schools and hostels for the community, will now be settled by the provincial government's concerned department. The Sindh High Court on Wednesday directed the Sindh Industries Department to hear both the parties and to decide upon the matter within 30 days of the order.

Some senior members of the community knocked the SHC's door, pleading that the incumbent body running the trust and all of its facilities has allegedly illicitly taken control. The petitioner was filed by Muhammad Iqbal, Abdul Rauf, Saeed Ahmed, Imran Hassan, Nizamuddin and Liaquat Ali, all Kaimkhani by caste, through advocate Syed Muhammad Saulat Rizvi.

According to them, the Kaimkhani Education Committee was chartered as a trust in 1995. The trust's elections were supposed to be held after every three years but they claimed that no polling process had occurred over the last two decades. Neither any by-laws have been formed since 1995 nor any memorandum or articles of association have been prepared, they added.

They maintained that after the enactment of Sindh Trust Act, 2020, which necessitated renewed registration of the registered trusts, on July 5, 2023, the trust was re-registered under the new act. A new trust deed was also executed on March 3, 2023, and the Assistant Director of Trusts in Hyderabad surprisingly without seeking any record of previous trustees and other documents to ensure that the trust was acting in accordance with the law re-registered the trust.

They contended that neither elections of the trust were held nor approval of the general body was sought before the 2023 registration. They maintained that new trust deed 2023 was prepared by five persons and none of them were trustees.

They also pointed out that a frozen bank account of the trust was also reopened without fulfilling the government's criteria. The lawyer prayed the court to appoint an administrator from among respectable figures of the community to hold transparent elections.

The SHC, meanwhile, ordered the Sindh Industries Department to scrutinise legality of the renewed registration and the trust deeds.