March 20, 2002	Wednesday	Muharram 5, 1423

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RAWALPINDI, March 19: The Lahore High Court, Rawalpindi Bench, was informed on Tuesday by the officials of the Small and Medium Enterprise Bank that the lock-up, which the bank had established for keeping the defaulters, had been closed and the Revenue official who had been appointed as recovery officer has been sent to the parent department.

The court had recovered five persons from the private jail of the bank through its bailiff on Monday. The court, however, did not order the registration of cases against bank officials responsible for keeping the citizens in the private jail.

On Tuesday when the case was taken up, Abdul Baseer Qureshi, counsel for the SME tried to justify the establishment of lock-up on the ground that under the Revenue Act 1972, the revenue officer had the authority to keep the defaulters in his custody.

He stated that since the SME had come into existence after the merger of Small Business and Finance Corporation and RDFC, and owned all the assets and liabilities, the Revenue Act 1972 which was applicable to SBFC, was applicable to it.

The counsel for the petitioner, Zulifikar Maluka, stated that Revenue Act was not applicable to the SME. He, however, stated that it had been decided by the management that in future no person would be kept in custody and the revue department official who was working on deputation as recovery officer, would be sent back to his parent department.

The petition was disposed of with the directive to the officials of the SME that the case of the petitioner should be heard and his money, registration book and registry should be returned.