Body formed on audit of state lands

LAHORE:The Punjab government has decided to conduct detailed audit of all state lands in the province and has set up a committee headed by Provincial Minister for Law, Parliamentary Affairs and Social Welfare Raja Basharat in this regard.

Raja Basharat said that the committee was beginning the audit work immediately and would submit a detailed report on all issues to the chief minister within a month. He said that the committee would conduct a special audit of housing schemes created in the province, especially the fake housing schemes so that legal action could be taken against such fake schemes.

The committee has been assigned the task to conduct complete audit of state lands across the province. The provincial minister for revenue will be the deputy convener while the member Colonies would act as the secretary cum member of the committee. Other members include senior member of Board of Revenue, law secretary Law and Punjab Land Records Authority (PLRA) director general.

According to a notification, the committee shall collect data on agricultural, residential, commercial, allotted, leased, un-utilised and encroached upon land in each district while collecting the data of annual income and arrears from those lands.

Human rights coordinators appointed: Provincial Minister for Human Rights and Minorities Affairs Ijaz Augustine has said the Punjab Human Rights Department is providing excellent services for the protection of human rights throughout the province. The committees constituted at the district level in this regard are yielding positive results.

He said more work was still needed to be done for providing rights to the common man at their doorstep. The appointment of coordinators at the level of tehsil will be more beneficial for the common man to feel the real change, said the minister while addressing a ceremony held in connection with the appointment coordinators of various tehsils at the Human Rights Camp Office on Wednesday.

The provincial minister issued notification appointing Sarwer Masih as coordinator of Pattoki, Afzal Khokhar as coordinator of NA-139 and Ehsan Gul as coordinator of Chunia Tehsil. The minister hoped that all the coordinators would play a key role in promoting tolerance in society.