Islamabad HC Orders Razing Of Pak Navy’s Farmhouse, Sailing Club in Capital: Report

The Islamabad High Court on Friday issued directions to initiate criminal proceedings against former naval chief Zafar Mehmud Abbasi and other officials for illegally constructing a sailing club and farmhouses on land belonging to a national park, Pakistan news agency the Dawn reported. The court also ordered that the structures be razed completely.

The Islamabad High Court chief justice Athar Minallah told the Capital Development Authority (CDA) to take over the farmhouses which were constructed. Justice Minallah said the Pakistan navy encroached land on the embankment of Rawal Lake which is also a protected national park area. The court pointed out that the engagement of the naval forces in ‘undertaking commercial or real estate ventures were definitely not in public interest’

“(The club building) shall not be regularized in any manner for having been illegally constructed in an ecologically sensitive area in violation of the mandatory provisions,” the court order, accessed by the Dawn, said. “Engaging in such undertakings, on the one hand, compromises the professionalism, integrity, cohesion of the Armed Forces while on the other it weakens the civilian institutions,” the verdict further added.

The court declared that the buildings constructed in the said area were illegal, without lawful authority and jurisdiction. It ordered the wildlife agency, Islamabad Wildlife Management Board, to restore the habitat in the area. It also asked the Pakistan navy to hand over the land to the Small Dams Organisation and asked it to cease its activities in Rawal Lake. The court highlighted that the construction of the PN Farms and the PN Sailing Club were ‘classic example of the non- existence of rule of law’.

The court noted that the Pakistan navy’s actions led to a conflict which is ‘intolerable in a society governed under the Constitution.’ The court also lashed out at the former naval chief Zafar Mehmud Abbasi saying he violated his oath and transgressed his constitutional duties.

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