President orders refund of Rs1.1m, deposited as CNG station fee, to aggrieved

Islamabad: President Dr Arif Alvi on Monday ordered a refund of Rs1.1 million to the complainant, who was denied return of the conversion fee deposited to Capital Development Authority (CDA) for setting up a Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) station. Major (r) Masood Bajwa, after getting permission to install a CNG station in 2007 by CDA, had deposited a conversion fee amounting to Rs1,111,111. After facing excessive delays in obtaining necessary NOCs from different departments, the complainant dropped the idea and requested CDA to refund the conversion fee.

The CDA rejected the request of the complainant on the basis of its Board’s decision, dated 15.08.2013, wherein it decided that “in future every NOC that is issued by CDA would be for a specific time period, fee paid for obtaining NOC should be non-refundable and provision/condition to these effects must be specifically stated in the NOC to be issued.”

The Authority conveyed the decision to the complainant on 23.07.2018 regretting the refund, after which the complainant raised the matter with the learned Wafaqi Mohtasib in 02.07.2020. The Wafaqi Mohtasib declined the instant representation of the complainant, on 04.09.2020, on the basis that the complaint had been made after three months from the date of CDA’s decision and was, therefore, liable to be set aside for being time barred.

Subsequently, Major (r) Masood Bajwa filed a representation to the President, on 09.11.2020, contending that the learned Wafaqi Mohtasib had closed his complaint on ground of limitation, not on merit, and CDA was depriving him from his rightful claim.

President Alvi in his written order said no law could deprive the applicant of his own deposited money as the CDA Board’s decision dated 15.08.2013 could not be implemented retrospectively.

He said since there was no law at the relevant time, the Board’s decision could not be applied to this case retrospectively. The President, thus, issued the direction “to return/refund the money deposited by the complainant.”