Rawalpindi Commissioner Gulzar Shah meets his Waterloo

ISLAMABAD: Zulfi Bukhari, the former Special Assistant to the Prime Minister, expressed satisfaction as Gulzar Shah as the Rawalpindi Commissioner was removed over the development that took place because of the Murree tragedy.

In an angry tweet, Bukhari said: “The Rawalpindi commissioner removed from post. Once an incompetent officer is always an incompetent officer. Come to think this embarrassment of an officer made the entire ring road inquiry report. An independent inquiry should be done on his alleged corruption & dubious reputation.”

Bukhari had to step down from the cabinet after his name indirectly figured in the inquiry report of the Rawalpindi Ring Road (R3) in connection with corruption in this aborted mega project. He had then stated that he had resigned as he wanted to get his name cleared from any dubious dealing in the R3 project.

Gulzar Shah had headed a three-member probe committee formed by the Punjab government that had alleged massive corruption in the project. As a result, the then Rawalpindi Commissioner, Capt. (retd) Mahmood, and some other officials were arrested and are being tried.

Later, Zulfi Bukhari filed a damages suit against the Rawalpindi commissioner in a court. Gulzar Shah has not been responding to the suit. Now that he is without official protection, he may soon find himself in hot waters since Bukhari is relentlessly pursuing the defamation case.

In an interesting development, just a day after Gulzar Shah’s removal as the commissioner, the Services & General Administration Department (Implementation & Coordination Wing) of the Punjab government has written a letter dated Jan 20, 2022 to the new commissioner Noorul Amin Mengal to act on a communication of Dec 12, 2021 penned by his predecessor.

The letter relating to Zulfi Bukhari’s damages case informed Mengal that “the matter regarding issuance of sanction of the Punjab government in respect of the Rawalpindi commissioner to defend the defamation suit in the court of law with the concurrence of the provincial finance department was placed before the competent authority. The finance department examined the case and recommended: the matter may result in huge financial implication for the Punjab government, therefore, the case with justification may be placed before the standing committee of the cabinet on finance and development for its recommendations prior to submission of the case to the provincial cabinet for decision”.

The communication conveyed to Mengal that he may initiate the process for placement of the case regarding issuance of sanction of the Punjab government in concurrence with the finance department before the provincial cabinet through the standing committee.

It is clear from the letter that the commissioner wanted the Punjab government to pay the lawyers’ fee to contest the case on his behalf. Gulzar Shah, belonging to the Pakistan Administrative Service (PAS), who gained fame in the Daska by-election rigging fiasco and R3 rigmarole, has finally met his Waterloo in the Murree tragedy inquiry. The Punjab government had to distance itself from its blue-eyed officer due to the damning findings against him.

Bureaucratic insiders, quoting the report, say that the commissioner’s role was most disappointing and indefensible in the incident. The Punjab government requested the federal authorities to place Gulzar Shah under suspension and order an inquiry against him under the service rules.

Gulzar Shah shot into the limelight when last year the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) took notice of rigging in the Daska by-poll where the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) were contesting in a one-on-one contest. While directing a re-poll after finding the massive wrongdoings in the exercise, the ECP had ordered immediate the removal of Gulzar Shah from the position of the Gujranwala commissioner.

The ECP inquiries had proved that the commissioner had not only failed to control his subordinates and implement the instructions of the ECP but was found involved in the planning of rigging by the administrative machinery. They had disclosed that Gulzar Shah had been holding unauthorized meetings in Daska and Sialkot during the election campaign and the maladministration culminated in the kidnapping and disappearance of 20 plus presiding officers along with cast ballots and records.

The ECP had not only ordered the immediate removal of Gulzar Shah as the Gujranwala commissioner but had also ruled that he should not be given any election related responsibility in future, thus raising serious question marks about his administrative capability and integrity.

However, the government had appointed him the Chairman of the Chief Minister Inspection Team soon after the Daska debacle, and after a couple of months made him the Rawalpindi commissioner, one of most sensitive and important assignments in Punjab’s administrative hierarchy.

In Rawalpindi, Gulzar Shah soon landed in the eye of the storm, when he inquired into corruption allegations in the R3 project. Two other members of the inquiry committee, including the then deputy commissioner and additional commissioner of Rawalpindi, had refused to sign the report prepared by Gulzar Shah, and wrote their notes of dissent, disagreeing with him. They had taken the position that no wrongdoing happened in the project whereas Gulzar Shah had alleged massive corruption in his findings.

Gulzar Shah’s report resulted in the arrest of the former Rawalpindi commissioner, removal of all administrations in Rawalpindi and Attock, the resignation of Zulfi Bukhari, a lot of political heat for Federal Minister Ghulam Sarwar Khan, and the abandonment of the mega R3 project.

As Gulzar Shah continued as the commissioner, he was also made the director general of the Rawalpindi Development Authority (RDA) and the project head of R3. He recently took a new plan for the ring road to the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC). However, experts believed that this plan may turn out to be a bigger scam than the previous R3 scandal. Now that Gulzar Shah, despite unflinching support from a powerful federal government figure, has been removed, it will be interesting to see how the successor administration looks at the new R3, which is the brainchild of the outgoing commissioner.

The Murree tragedy inquiry revealed that the Rawalpindi commissioner held no coordination meeting prior to the crisis for preparation of snow season; neither did he hold any emergency session during or after the incident.

It also said that the commissioner reviewed the SOS message sent by the Provincial Disaster Management Authority on Friday after a lapse of 24 hours when 23 innocent persons had died.

PAS insiders say Gulzar Shah is not new to controversies; he was removed from his position of the district coordination officer of Multan after three months, and from the ministries of industries and law of Punjab after a few months for poor performance. In 2017, the Central Selection Board did not promote him to grade 20. However during the tenure of the present government, he found the right patrons who gave him protection, key postings and grade 21.