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A Senate panel on Monday showed concern over the suspension of construction of Kashmir apartments in G-13 and ordered the housing ministry to investigate this stalled project.

Under the chairmanship of Senator Haji Hidayatullah, Senate Standing Committee on Housing and Works was held which took up the project for discussion along with other items.

After its completion, the building will have 1,467 apartments. This project was highly prioritized by previous Prime Minister Imran Khan, who not only performed the groundbreaking of it but personally inspected it later.

However, the project, during the PTI regime, could not be enhanced and after initial work, it was almost frozen. The committee was briefed that at present this project is in the execution phase and 16percent of work on it has been accomplished.

The members of the committee were also informed that because of the unprecedented increase in the cost of construction material, the project faced inordinate delay. It was also informed that price adjustment included in the contract, according to the Pakistan Engineering Council’s standards and price adjustment rules, does not cover the present hyper escalation in prices of construction goods.

Moreover, the ministry is doing everything in its power to come to an agreeable resolution and has forwarded a summary of the problems to the Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) for approval of recommendations.

Officials from the ministry further told the committee members that inflation and its influence on all projects of the Federal Government Employees Housing Authority (FGEHA) were being consulted with the executive board for its guidance and advice.

Meanwhile, ministry officials were asked to submit the particulars of all outsourced parties working on various projects for a comprehensive analysis.

The high-level meeting was also attended by Minister for Housing and Works Maulana Abdul Wasay who briefed the committee about the accomplishments, challenges, and targets of his ministry.