The Legend of Aladdin Park-Who Allows What and When

This is a story about how Karachi’s 52 acres of comfortable land reserved for the park has been a victim of large-scale illegal commercial activities over the years, and the land is part of the famous safari park in the eastern part of the city.

The news obtained at least five copies of agreements that allowed commercial activities in the park within five years and found out under whose supervision these agreements were signed.

The park is now called Aladdin Amusement Park, the park used to house Aladdin Shopping Center and Pavilion End Club. On June 14, 2021, the Supreme Court declared both of them illegal and ordered their removal within two days. Then Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) took immediate action and complied with the regulations.

The “Sindh Province Urban Land Disposal Regulations” stipulate that, except for the original purpose, it shall not be rebuilt or used for any other purpose. Comfortable plots are reserved for parks, gardens, playgrounds, cemeteries, hospitals, schools, colleges, libraries, community centers, mosques or other such purposes.

It started in 1995

The legend of Aladdin Park began in 1995, when Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Chief Minister Said Abdullah Shah and the Chief Secretary formed a committee to transform the 52-acre safari park into an amusement park. Hameed Haroon serves as the chairman of the committee, and KMC administrator Fahim Zaman is one of its members.

On May 30, Zaman and Zodiac Joyland signed an agreement to acquire 52 acres of land facing Rashid Minhas Road for a period of 25 years to develop an amusement park based on the Disneyland model. The condition of the lease is that the land will be used for convenience facilities.

The developer is bound by the agreement and must submit a detailed master plan and detailed design of the proposed amusement park to KMC within six months.

The agreement stipulates that 66% of the area will be reserved as open space, while the remaining 34% can be covered by building structures and machinery, of which no more than 5% can be used in commercial bars such as gift shops and snacks.

Article 5 of the agreement clearly restricts the developer from subletting or transferring the project land or any part of it to others.

New agreement

Zaman served as an administrator until April 4, 1996. On April 9, when PPP was still in power and Anzar Hussain Zaidi was the new KMC administrator, a new agreement was signed between KMC and AA Joyland.

There seems to be a serious anomaly in this agreement: not only allows subletting, but also approves food and merchandise stores, exhibition centers, and mini cinemas for a period of 24 and a half years.

Due to the company’s internal affairs, the company name was also changed from Zodiac Joyland to AA Joyland, but Ibrahim Shamsi is still their managing director.

On April 22, KMC and AA Joyland signed a lease agreement. The commodity sales outlets mentioned in the document are interpreted as commodity sales, franchising and food sales outlets subleased by AA Joyland in the commercial area.

Article 7.4 of the contract stipulates that AA Joyland has the right to sublet the point of sale to any type of retailer, restaurant or other supplier of goods or services.

This is clearly where the illegal act started. Advocate Zubair Ahmed stated that KMC has no right to allow the establishment of clubs and shopping malls on facilities plots, and therefore can never make any subletting in this regard.

Additional lease

On March 21, 1998, KMC and AA Joyland signed a supplementary lease, according to which the agreement on May 30, 1995 broke away from the lease.

At that time, the then Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) Farooq Sattar was the Minister of Local Government of the province, and Waseem Akhtar was the Minister of Urban Planning.

Sattar told the “News” that there were no shops in his time. “I tried to reduce all commercial activities in the park,” he said, adding that the agreement signed in 1996 was flawed and it allowed subletting of shops.

According to the additional lease signed in 1998, 25% of all income obtained by the company through subletting will be deposited into KMC, and 10% of all income deposits from the subletting will be paid to KMC.

Article 9.2 of the additional lease stipulates that the company agrees not to hold any festivals in the amusement park, except for festivals in the water park, Basang Festival and Eid al-Fitr during Ramadan.

On June 15, 2021, while talking to a private news channel, Zaman shared how he tried to control the shopping mall in Aladdin Park in 1999, when Sindh was under the governor’s rule during the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz government. He was made a KMC administrator again, but he was unable to continue the operation because “law enforcement agencies did not cooperate.”

CDGK era

Until 2001, Pakistan was under a military coup and KMC became the Karachi City Government (CDGK), which filed a lawsuit against AA Joyland. Naimatullah Khan of Jamaat-e-Islami was the Nazi Party (mayor) of the city at the time.

In order to resolve these issues amicably, another agreement was signed on October 26, 2004. The agreement stipulates that CDGK’s revenue department will negotiate with the company to sell unsold commercial real estate through public auctions, and 25% of net sales will continue to go to CDGK.

CDGK exempts the park’s entertainment tax, and the benefits of the exemption will be passed on to the public who visit the park.

Tingduan Club

After Khan took office, Mustafa Kamal of MQM became the mayor of KMC. Under his leadership, the company established the Pavilion End Club and the wedding hall in the amusement park, but did not take any action. Despite repeated attempts, the news could not reach him for comment.

Until 2014, when the PPP was in power in the province and Sharjeel Inam Memon was the Minister of LG, the company filed at least two lawsuits against KMC.

Under Memon’s supervision, the final sub-appendices were passed on September 9, 2014 to cancel these cases. One point worth noting in the appendix is ​​that KMC allows the establishment of Pavilion End Club on the Aladdin Amusement Park site and requires the company to pay 1.5 million rupees per year as a KMC membership share.

As for the banquet facilities, events and social gatherings held in the various venues of the club, according to the agreement, the company is liable to pay 1.5 million rupees per year.

As a result, the wedding was held in the amusement park. However, according to an additional lease signed under Sattar’s supervision in 1998, the park does not allow such events.

Maymont told The News that Minister LG has nothing to do with this micro-level agreement. He claimed that urban affairs “can’t even reach the minister at such a micro level.”

problem

When MQM’s Akhtar became mayor again in 2019, the wedding and banquet halls were demolished on the order of SC. When the “News” asked him why he did not stop commercial activities during his earlier tenure, he explained that his hands were restrained due to the earlier agreement and the suspension order issued by the court.

Amir Shakeel, deputy general manager of AA Joyland, stated that their lease agreement will end on June 21, 2021. On the other hand, KMC insists that the 25-year agreement has ended in 2020 because it started in 1995. But Shakeel emphasized that the agreement began in 1996, so they obtained a stay order from the Sindh High Court.

Zaman told the “News” that the problem is not the subletting, but the Aladdin shopping center, Pavilion End Club, banquet hall and wedding hall in the amusement park.

He said that according to the 1995 and 1996 agreements and the master plan submitted by the company and approved by KMC, there was no mention of shopping centers or private clubs.

As for the sub-leasing of 5% of the commercial area mentioned in the 1996 agreement, he said it was aimed at small restaurants, gift shops and merchandise shops that traditionally exist in amusement parks around the world.

He pointed out that in the following years, under the surveillance of Sattar, Khan and Kamal, the construction of shopping centers was illegally authorized. He concluded that by 2014, during Maymont’s PPP term as LG minister, clubs and wedding halls were also illegally formalized.