Court summons record of plots given to judges

LDA to submit report on which judges got plots from Nawaz Sharif.

LAHORE:

A division bench of the Lahore High Court on Monday directed the Lahore Development Authority director general to submit a report by January 2 about plots allegedly gifted to 13 LHC judges by former prime minister Mian Nawaz Sharif in 1993.

The bench headed by Justice Muhammad Khalid Mehmood Khan issued this order while hearing a 17-year-old petition seeking the cancellation of residential plots given to 28 LHC judges during Nawaz Sharif’s first tenure as prime minister.

The bench was hearing an appeal against a single bench’s decision in 1994 to dismiss the petition, which was filed by Advocate Saiful Haq Ziayee in 1993.

The appeal hearings were restarted this year after the case had been dormant since 2002.

The petitioner submitted that plots were allotted to LHC judges in Johar Town and Garden Town in violation of Lahore Development Authority rules stating that properties could only be given to judges who have no residential property. The judges had also submitted affidavits to this extent, he said.

He said the allotment of plots to sitting judges amounted to bribery. He noted that at the time these plots were allotted, a petition for the reopening of the Zulfikar Ali Bhutto case was pending before Justice (r) Rashid Aziz Khan and Justice (r) Amir Malik.

He prayed the court to set aside the single bench’s order and cancel the plots allotted to the judges, who are all retired now.

The judges include former chief justices of the Lahore High Court Mian Mehboob Ahmad and Rashid Aziz Khan.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 13^th, 2011.