Facing the axe: LG secretary asks Hyderabad Development Authority to justify its existence

Authority also instructed to submit report on NOC records.

HYDERABAD: After surviving nearly four decades, the Hyderabad Development Authority (HDA), seems to be taking its last gasps. Having yielded much of its functions over the years, the authority’s current responsibilities fall short of ensuring its survival.

“Submit a report to justify why the HDA should be allowed to exist,” demanded Local Government Secretary Javed Hanif at a meeting on Friday, giving only three days to HDA officials to comply with his directives. The alert came on the same day that the Sindh Assembly passed a bill transferring town planning work from district administration to the provincial government.

The HDA and its subsidiary, Water and Sanitation Agency (Wasa), have been coping with a financial crunch on the back of corruption and inefficiency charges for over a decade or so, with overmanning during the last two governments putting additional burden on their finances.

The HDA is left only with its planning and development wing, which provides advisory services to builders. However, it will now be made a part of the Sindh Building Control Authority (SBCA) under the new bill.

The authority’s revenue generation still falls short of meeting its expenditures as employees are not even paid regular salaries.

“We have been paid just once in past three months,” claimed the HDA workers’ union leader Imtiaz Kolachi, complaining of political appointments. Kolachi favours the idea of merging the planning wing into the SBCA. “A senior official of the HDA’s finance section, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, also believed the solution lies in HDA’s dissolution. “It should be made part of the SBCA and Wasa should be given the status of an independent water board,” he suggested.

Wasa, which is responsible for water supply and drainage to the three urban talukas of the district, has a staff of over 3,000 workers, over half of whom are employed on a contractual basis.

“A thorough inquiry must be conducted in the finances of HDA as well as its appointments and promotions during the last ten years,” said the HDA officer..

At the meeting, Hyderabad Commissioner Jamal Mustafa Syed informed the secretary that the district administration is not being provided no-objection certificate (NOC) records issued to the builders by the HDA. After hearing this, the local government secretary also directed the HDA to submit, within a week, another report of the NOC issued to the builders since 2004. HDA director-general Ghulam Mohammad Qaimkhani could not be contacted.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 10^th, 2014.