Did NAB chairman, Sindh CM really achieve impossible task?

ISLAMABAD: Two DGs of NAB and some senior bureaucrats of the Sindh government will be nominated for civil awards for delivering what was unthinkable in the province known for bad repute of bureaucracy and doling out of state lands.

The NAB top management and Sindh government claim that following their collaborative approach, adopted and approved by NAB chairman and Sindh chief minister, almost 1.8m acres of forestland have not only been recovered from encroachers and illegal allottees but demarcated and registered in provincial forest land record. The value of the recovered land is claimed to be over three trillion rupees (Over Rs3,000 billion).

When approached, both Sindh chief secretary and top NAB officials confirmed to The News that 1.8 million acres of forestland have so far been recovered, demarcated and registered in forest department’s land record.

In the next step, the NAB and Sindh government are all set to target encroachers and illegal allottees of the state land in urban Sindh, and Katcha land in rural Sindh.

The recovery and mutation of forestland already done include 775,795 acres of riverine and 197,000 acres of irrigated land of the reserved forestland, and 881,696 acres of rangeland belonging to protected forestland.

To make it possible, the NAB Chairman Lt Gen (retd) Nazir Ahmed Butt in consultation with the Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah devised the strategy of collaborative approach where instead of going for making NAB cases, the NAB and Sindh government worked together to retrieve a huge chunk of state land from encroachers and illegal allottees.

Top NAB management is all praise for Sindh chief minister who, the sources said, despite political pressures offered his complete support to the Bureau to recover such a huge size of state land from encroachers and illegal allottees.

According to the sources, three senior officers of the Sindh government including chief secretary, Senior Member Board of Revenue and Secretary Forest are fully involved with the NAB to do this job. Two officers of NAB -- DG NAB Karachi and DG NAB Sukkur -- are being nominated for civil awards by the NAB management for what they did. Three officers of NAB Sukkur and two officers of NAB Karachi are also being sent on Umrah by the NAB management.

The Sindh CM in a recent meeting with NAB chairman indicated that the provincial government will also reward its officials, some of whom are being considered for civil awards.

It is said that three months have been given for leftover work, including survey and eviction of remaining encroachment. Issues connected with status and usage of katcha lands are to be tackled in the next phase. Similar drive has been planned against illegal encroachments and allotment of state land in urban Sindh.