Senate Functional Committee on Devolution has summoned the officers of all relevant authorities in its next meeting to sort out the issue of transfer of 172 acres of land of Pakistan Tourism Development Corporation (PTDC) located at Gadani Fish Harbour to MK Pakistan Pvt Ltd, Karachi. The committee met here with Senator Maula Bakhsh Chandio in the chair at the Parliament Lodges on Wednesday and discussed the progress report in the public petition regarding transfer of 172 acres of land of PTDC located at Gadani Fish Harbour to MK Pakistan Pvt Ltd, Karachi.
The committee decided to summon the cabinet secretary in its next meeting who sent unsigned summary to the Law Ministry regarding the transfer of 172 acres of land of the PTDC.
Chandio said if the summary is wrong then the case should be sent to the National Accountability Bureau (NAB).
The legal advisor of Cabinet Division said, "We wrote to the Law Ministry to decide about mutation (ownership) of land. According to my information, the federal government has ownership of the 172 acres of land of PTDC."
Committee member Senator Raza Rabbani said that the Law Ministry has not any role in this regard, adding that it is the revenue department which determines the ownership of land.
The petitioner told the committee that three advertisements for auction were given during 2011 to 2014 regarding controversial 172 acres of land. He said that the cabinet secretary had prepared a summary regarding 172 acres of land and sent it to the prime minister after searching record and unanimous approval of board as price of 350,000 per acre in 2015. He claimed that the summary was held on the direction of the then Prime Minister's Principal Secretary Fawad Hassan Fawad.
After having a detailed discussion, the committee decided to summon the officers of relevant authorities with documents in the next meeting to sort out the issue.
Senators including Mian Raza Rabbani, Mushtaq Ahmed, Saadia Abbasi, Lieutenant-General Salahuddin Tirmizi (retd), Chaudhry Muhammad Sarwar, and Dr Meher Taj Roghani, secretary Cabinet Division and others attended the meeting.