MULTAN: The Multan Development Authority (MDA) has decided to give Rs600 million as bridge financing for the Multan Metro Bus Project from its own income without any lawful authority, Dawn has learnt.

The MDA, through a circulation, got approval of the proposal from the governing body while stating that the approval was being taken through the circulation on account of urgency of the matter.

`In order to expedite the civil work and other related matters, Rs1,000 million (Rs1bn) were reappropriated from Package-3 and Package-4, respectively, for the construction of Metro Depot and Command and Control Centre(Package-9) where no allocation was reserved in the Annual Development Programme 201516,` the proposal that was dispatched to the members of the MDA governing body on June 9 stated.

It said endeavours were made to get Rs1bn in this regard and a release letter for the funds (for Package-3 and Package-4) was issued by the planning and development department but the amount could not be made online, resulting in the shortage of the amount (Rs1bn) against both the packages.

The circulation added that the work on both the packages was in progress and if Rs600m were not made available, completion of the entire project would be delayed.

`To 1(eep the progress of worl< at packages-3 and 4 accelerated, it isproposed that a bridge Enancing of Rs600m from the MDA account may be made which is the minimum requirement for the payment against the worl< being executed during the month of June.

The proposal claimed the governing body was competent vide delegation of powers item No4 (X) to undertake any works and incur any expenditure.

Sources said the bridge Enancing was a type of a short-term loan, usually taken out for a period of a couple of years. There should be two parties for bridge financing, one that was giving the amount for loan and the other that was receiving the amount but in this particular case there was only one party, i.e. MDA and no agreement in this regard had been signed, they alleged.

They claimed the MDAauthorities orits governing body were not authorised to transfer a single penny to any worl< or project that had not been initiated by the development authority itself.

The sources said the delegation of powers item No 4 did not address such deals and how such a big amount could be given as bridge financing through a mere circulation without discussing it in the meeting of the governing body.

They claimed that the decision had been taken on the direction of the commissioner, who is also holding the additional charge of the MDA, without approval of the Ministry of Housing, Urban Development and Public Health Engineering.

Theysaidtheproposalhadbeen approved through the circulationto avoid objections from corners concerned and to keep the matter secrete.

MDA Additional Director General Altaf Husain Sario said there was already a precedence of bridge financing between the Punjab government and the National Highway Authority (NHA) and the government departments could do that among themselves.

He denied the report that there was only one party involved, saying two parties, MDA and MMBP, were involved in the matter.

He assured that the amount would be returned to the MDA.

Commissioner Asadullah Khan was not available for comments despite repeated attempts while he also did not respond to the text messages.