Forests land should not be used for any other purpose: LHC

LAHORE
Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah of the Lahore High Court on Monday remarked that nobody could be able to save the next generation from bad weather impact if the existing forests were not preserved properly.
The judge remarked that forest compared to land ratio is already on low side due to which the country is facing bad weather impacts and if land reserved for forests were replaced then who would protect the coming next generation.
He observed that the land meant for forests should not be utilised for any other purpose. He gave these remarks while hearing a petition challenging different government’s projects being built in South Punjab.
Advocate Saad Rasool had filed the petition and pointed out that the government was replacing land meant for forests with its own project. Thus, the government was violating the law by building new projects at the land meant for forests in Dera Ghazi Khan Area. With the help of different departments, a land measuring 6,900 acre was evacuated from the illegal possession, the lawyer told the judge. By now, he said, 600 acres land was still in the control of land grabbers while 270 acres were in the possession of army. At this, Justice Shah ordered the government to evacuate the land from the land grabbers with directives to submit a report. The court adjourned further hearing for Nov 24.
Govt issued notice on plea against coal power plants: The Lahore High Court Monday issued notices to Punjab government and other departments on a petition challenging establishment of coal power plants being established in the province.
A local Lawyer moved the petition and argued that billion of rupees were being wasted on obsolete technology of coal power plants, which would create serious environment impacts in Pakistan under CPEC and Coal Power Plants at Gaddani had already been cancelled due to environment impacts and contracts to favourite parties had been awarded without tenders, merit and transparency.
He said Pakistan installed capacity of electricity was sufficient for production and federal government was not paying payments to the IPPs and circular debt was piling up.
The counsel argued that as a direct consequence of the damage caused by the construction and operation of the coal power projects, the residents of the nearby areas and environment of Pakistan would suffer from a severely depleted output, which would be significantly lower than the optimum levels it was expected to operate at.
He said this inevitable loss of output would significantly impair the petitioner’s ability to discharge its contractual commitments under the PPA and Generation Licence, whilst concurrently affecting the reliance that the National Grid has developed thereon. As a consequence, he said, the government would also incur financial losses under the PPA and other agreements, which could potentially render the power plant financially unfeasible to operate.
Consequently, construction of the proposed projects would violate the petitioner’s fundamental rights enshrined in the Constitution. He asked the court to declare the projects illegal. An additional advocate general Shan Gull opposed the petition and said the petitioners had no lucus standi to challenge the projects.
Justice Mamoon Rasheed Sheikh admitted the petition for regular hearing and issued notices to Punjab government, energy department, Punjab power development company, environment department and as well as two Chinese companies who were establishing coal power plants at Sahiwal and Kot Addu. The judge called for reply and Parawise comments from the respondents for November 24.