EDITORIAL: Punjab’s decision to establish a dedicated authority for identifying, managing and monetising under-utilised public assets deserves support because it addresses a problem that has been allowed to persist for far too long.
Government land and property scattered across departments, autonomous bodies and provincial entities often remain idle, encroached upon or trapped in outdated administrative procedures while the province simultaneously struggles to finance infrastructure, social services and development. Creating a specialised institution to bring these assets into productive use is therefore both timely and economically sensible.
The rationale behind the Asset Management Authority of Punjab is difficult to dispute. The province lacks a centralised mechanism for identifying the full extent of its landed assets, assessing their present condition, determining their best use and ensuring that any lease, development or disposal process reflects genuine market value. The proposed digital inventory and GIS-based database should help correct that weakness by making it harder for valuable public property to remain invisible within departmental records or vulnerable to encroachment and informal occupation.
The authority’s broader mandate is equally promising. Public assets should not remain frozen simply because existing procedures are fragmented or administratively cumbersome. Properly managed, they can generate non-tax revenue, attract private investment, support new infrastructure and create employment. At a time when provincial finances remain under pressure, extracting greater economic and social value from assets already owned by the government is preferable to imposing further burdens on taxpayers or relying indefinitely on additional borrowing.
The safeguards included in the framework also appear reasonable. Valuation, disposal and grievance committees are intended to introduce structure into decisions that have historically been vulnerable to discretion. Annual audit by the auditor general provides another layer of oversight, while the requirement that 98 percent of project proceeds be deposited into the provincial consolidated fund should ensure that the overwhelming share of revenue returns to the public exchequer. These provisions can support transparency, provided they are implemented with the same seriousness with which they have been drafted.
That qualification is important because Punjab’s record of implementation gives ample reason for caution. Successive governments have launched authorities, task forces and reform initiatives with similarly impressive objectives, only for progress to slow once the initial announcement passed. Institutional overlap, bureaucratic resistance, political interference and weak follow-through have repeatedly reduced ambitious plans to little more than administrative additions. A new authority can solve a coordination problem, but it can also become another layer of bureaucracy unless its mandate is enforced, its decisions are transparent and its performance is measured against clear outcomes.
The method of disposal and monetisation will require particular scrutiny. Public property must not become an opportunity for politically connected individuals or preferred investors to acquire valuable assets below market value. Every major transaction should be conducted through open, competitive and independently verified processes. Asset valuations, reserve prices, bidding documents, successful bidders and final proceeds should all be placed in the public domain. Where assets are retained for social or strategic purposes rather than monetised, that reasoning should also be recorded and disclosed.
The most effective safeguard would be regular publication of progress. The authority should release quarterly reports listing assets identified, properties surveyed, encroachments removed, projects approved, transactions completed and revenue generated. These disclosures should also show how much of the proceeds has reached the provincial consolidated fund and what public purposes those funds are supporting. Without such reporting, citizens will have little way of knowing whether the authority is unlocking public wealth or merely adding another institutional nameplate.
Punjab has correctly identified a serious governance failure and proposed a potentially workable response. The opportunity is considerable, but so is the risk of repeating familiar mistakes. The authority will ultimately be judged by whether idle assets begin producing transparent and measurable public value. The initiative is sound on paper. Its credibility will depend entirely on what follows.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2026
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