Cabinet okays draft of law to facilitate property inheritance

Considering the lengthy process of obtaining administration letters and succession certificates from court in cases of property inheritance, the Sindh government has decided to enact the Letters of Administration and Succession Certificates Bill 2020 so that they can be issued directly by the National Database & Registration Authority (Nadra).

The decision was taken on Wednesday during a meeting of the cabinet chaired by Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah at the CM House. The meeting was attended by all the provincial ministers, the chief executive’s law adviser, the chief secretary and the chairman of the planning & development board.

The law department presented an item of law enactment in respect of administration letters and succession certificates. The CM’s law adviser Barrister Murtaza Wahab said administration letters and succession certificates are currently being issued by component courts having jurisdiction under the Succession Act 1925.

He said that issuance of administration letters and succession certificates from court is a lengthy process. A law can be enacted as has been done by the federal government to expedite the mechanism and facilitate the applicants, as well as to curtail fraud and forgery in the process, he added.

Under the proposed law, the heirs of a deceased person will be able to apply for succession directly to Nadra to obtain their administration letters and succession certificates. The cabinet approved the draft of the law and referred it to the provincial assembly.

School principals

The school education department told the cabinet that 2,000 principals of public schools had been appointed on contractual basis through the Sukkur IBA University in 2015, and now their contracts were about to expire.

Education Minister Saeed Ghani said the court has directed his department to appoint principals through the Sindh Public Service Commission (SPSC). Appointments through the commission will take some time, so the services of the contractual principals can be continued until appointments are made through the SPSC, he added.

After a thorough discussion, the cabinet approved the request of the education department and also directed the chief secretary to request the SPSC to expedite the selection procedure.

Irrigation lands

The cabinet was told that encroachments along the irrigation channels, lands and colonies across the province had been identified and their details presented in the previous meeting of the advisory group.

Irrigation Minister Suhail Anwar Siyal told the cabinet that in the first phase, encroachments are being removed from operational areas (that create hindrances in the smooth flow of irrigation water). He said encroachments will be removed from irrigation lands where commercial activities have been started. Approving the proposal, the cabinet ordered expediting removal of encroachments.

Vehicle allotments

The cabinet took up the requests of different departments of the provincial government for the purchase of motor vehicles. Ministers Shabbir Bijarani and Mukesh Kumar Chawla said that a large number of vehicles, particularly of 800cc and 1,000cc have been abandoned due to minor mechanical faults.

They said the abandoned vehicles can be made operational with minor repairs. They proposed that instead of purchasing new vehicles, the abandoned ones should be repaired and allotted to the entitled government employees.

The cabinet approved the proposal and also constituted a committee to be headed by Bijarani to formulate a policy for the allotment of government vehicles to entitled employees.

He was also directed to prepare the auction policy for abandoned vehicles and present the proposals within 15 days. The other members of the committee will be Chawla and Ghani, and the general administration secretary will serve as the new body’s secretary.

Low-cost housing

The cabinet formed another committee to identify land for low- and medium-cost housing in Katchi Abadis across Karachi so that low-cost housing projects can be started there. The body will be headed by Local Government Minister Syed Nasir Shah, with Bijarani and Chawla as its members.