No progress by PA panel on Lahore Gymkhana lease scrutiny

LAHORE: A special committee of the Punjab Assembly tasked with examining the Lahore Gymkhana Club’s lease of state land is yet to submit its report, around 20 months after it was given two months to do so, and has not met since its first and only sitting. Special Committee No. 6 was set up in September 2024 under the Rule 187 of the Assembly’s rules of procedure after MPA Amjad Ali Javed moved an adjournment motion over the club’s affairs. Headed by MPA Samiullah Khan, the committee was given a nine-point mandate and asked to report to the House within two months. Under its terms of reference, the committee was to examine the legality of the lease, the club’s compliance with a 2023 rent policy, the construction of unauthorised structures, the financial loss to the exchequer and its recovery, the club’s exclusive use of public land in Bagh-e-Jinnah, and its membership criteria. The committee held its only meeting on Sept 30, 2024, the first sitting of an Assembly committee to be opened to the public and telecasted live. It directed the Board of Revenue (BoR) senior member to appear in person with the land record and a market valuation, and asked the law department to advise on the legality of the lease and the options available to protect the public interest. The agriculture department, the deputy commissioner and the director general of audit were also asked to attend. The minutes show the next meeting was to be held “in due course”, but no further sitting has taken place. The committee set up in Sept 2024 has met only once and was given two months to submit its findings Samiullah Khan tells Dawn that he plans to convene a meeting this week during the assembly session and take the issue to its logical end. However, any decision of the committee, he stresses, would be in the ‘larger public interest’. He did not say why the issue lingered on for 20 months, though the committee had been tasked to settle the matter within two months. Documents available with Dawn show a