The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) is said to be investigating whether rules and regulations were violated in the release of Rs 800 million by the Balochistan government as compensation for property damage to Senator Nawabzada Haji Lashkari Raisani, the younger brother of Chief Minister Nawab Aslam Raisani, said a senior official on condition of anonymity.
This was, however, denied by NAB's spokesperson Zafar Iqbal Khan who stated that there was no such investigation or review in progress. However, a senior official insisted that "NAB will take legal action against him and all those government officials who sanctioned the payment if the investigators establish that the government of Balochistan had released the amount to Raisani against rules and regulations," source said. NAB is said to have procured all documents in this regard and its legal experts are reviewing them, he said.
When asked whether the then chief secretary Nasir Mahmood Khosa had opposed the decision and conveyed to the government that rules did not allow a payment, the NAB official said that they were investigating all aspects of the case. Lashkari Raisani, a sitting PPP Senator, received a cheque of Rs 817.038 million in August last year from the provincial government in compensation for property damage that his family had suffered under the military regime of General Musharraf.
He moved the BHC in 2002 against the Raisani family's rival, the Rind family, accusing the latter of damaging their ancestral homes, lands, archaeological sites, libraries and crops in Mithri area of Bolan in connivance with the then provincial government and military authorities.
The court's verdict, the source added, was to compensate Raisani in accordance with the law. Therefore, NAB's legal experts are trying to determine if there is any such law which allows direct compensation to the petitioner who suffered losses due to personal enmity or dispute. Ahmad Bakhsh Lehri, the then chief secretary Balochistan who is currently working as secretary of the Ministry of National Food Security and Research, said that the provincial government had released the compensation money to Raisani following the court order. He, however, declined to comment when asked whether there was any law that allows direct compensation.