A judge on Wednesday dismissed a non-government organization’s plea against the termination of its contract by the civic authorities to operate the Arts and Crafts Village (ACV).
Justice Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui of the Islamabad High Court (IHC) ruled that the Indus Heritage Trust (IHT) petition was not maintainable.
IHT counsel Anees Jilani maintained in his miscellaneous application that a formal 10-year agreement had been signed between the trust and the CDA on January 1, 2005, after which a management committee was formed to run the village.
On March 25, the CDA’s counsel had informed the court that the civic authority had revoked the agreement with the IHT. However, on Wednesday, Jilani argued that there was no termination clause in the agreement with the CDA and termed the decision ‘illegal’. He said that the agreement had an arbitration clause, but instead of opting for arbitration, the CDA terminated the agreement.
He informed the court that the CDA had agreed to hand over the village to the IHT and to pay salaries to the employees. He said Shariq Khan, the then project director, was also among the employees hired for a specific task for one year. However, he later tried to create confusion between the CDA and IHT.
Jilani requested the court to suspend the termination order till the disposal of the application and cancel the project director’s reinstatement order.
After the proceedings, Jilani said that he will “challenge this decision in the Supreme Court”. The contract to run the project was given to the IHT during the tenure of former CDA chief Kamran Lashari in 2005.
Published in The Express Tribune, April 12th, 2012.
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