Shift Napa to CM House if no other space available: SC

The Karachi registry of the country’s top court told the Sindh government on Wednesday to shift the National Academy of Performing Arts (Napa) to the Chief Minister House if no other space is available, but it should be moved out of the Hindu Gymkhana heritage site.

Hearing a petition about the construction of an auditorium and the allotment of an office to Napa, a three-member Supreme Court bench headed by Justice Gulzar Ahmed asked a provincial law officer how the construction was allowed at the property declared a heritage site and why the Napa office has not been shifted yet.

The law officer said the government has been unable to arrange an alternative space for moving Napa, adding that the provincial administration is facing a shortage of space for its own offices.

The officer said the Hindu Gymkhana was rented out for establishing Napa, but the academy’s administration raised an auditorium and obtained a stay order from the court.

The court observed that the heritage site cannot be handed over to any institution in such a manner. The bench said the heritage site has to be vacated, and asked the law officer to shift Napa to the CM House if no other alternative space can be arranged.

The SC directed the officer to submit a reply with regard to the shifting of Napa from the heritage site. Napa’s counsel had earlier argued in court that the Hindu Gymkhana heritage site was leased out to the academy for 30 years.

The counsel said that the academy’s administration has not changed the character of the main building, but it has constructed an auditorium on the vacant land, leaving the heritage site alone.

Earlier, a Hindu welfare organisation had also challenged the handing over of the Hindu Gymkhana to Napa, requesting the court to take back the heritage site, and claiming that the property belonged to the Hindu community of Karachi since before the Partition.

In September 2005, the heritage site was leased to Napa for three decades. A controversy broke out after the Sindh Culture Department raised an objection to Napa’s construction of an auditorium, funded by the UAE, adjacent to the Hindu Gymkhana building.

The culture department had also asked Napa to vacate the heritage site, accusing the academy’s administration of breaching the lease agreement and violating the provisions of the Sindh Cultural Heritage (Preservation) Act 1994.