ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court of Pakistan and the Prime Minister of Pakistan Diamer-Bhasha and Mohmand Dams Fund were officially closed on Thursday by the supreme court. The fund was established in 2018 with great fanfare with the goal of raising money to build massive dams in the nation.
The account had Rs 23.6 billion as of October 4, the majority of which was the markup that the federal government had paid. The Supreme Court ordered that the funds in the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) account be transferred to the Public Account of the Federation in accordance with Article 78(2)(b) of the Constitution before the account was closed.
A three-judge Supreme Court bench made up of Justice Shahid Bilal Hassan, Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Qazi Faez Isa, and Justice Naeem Akhtar Afghan gave the directives.
The Supreme Court further ordered that a sub-account be created in the federation’s public account or that other necessary steps be taken to enable the amount to be lent to the “best-rated private scheduled bank or banks” in order to earn markup before ruling on the applications and all other related requests.
The instructions stipulated that the sum and the markup accrued would be used whenever any money was needed for the construction of these dams.
The federal government and the Water and Power Development Authority (Wapda) together filed an application with the Supreme Court, requesting that the money be relocated to the Wapda’s official account with the NBP.
Regarding the real amount in the account, the SBP told the court in its report that as of October 4, 2024, the entire amount (principal plus mark-up) was Rs23.67 billion, of which the total amount collected was Rs11.47 billion and the mark-up gained was Rs12.19 billion.
According to the report, as a result, the accumulated markup has exceeded the amount received. The federal government was identified as the payer of the mark-up when the court asked who was responsible for it.
The Wapda attorney said that the current estimated cost of these dams was Rs740 billion, or Rs 260 billion for Mohmand Dam and Rs 480 billion for Diamer-Bhasha Dam.
The sum in the account only made up 3.2% of the total amount needed to build these dams, according to the court’s order, and the government had already paid a significant chunk of this amount in markup.
