KARACHI, Nov 11: A division bench of the Sindh High Court issued a notice to the National Accountability Bureau to ascertain whether it had taken cognizance of the city courts postal savings bank scam and recovered any amount from the accused.
Huge amounts deposited by about 290 lawyers and others are stuck in the 40-million-rupee scam.
The postal authorities have initially disclaimed responsibility for a large number of deposits as they find no mention in the official record and were apparently given to a former employee in return for a hefty profit rate of 18 per cent.
The notice was issued on the assertion of Advocate Abdul Hafeez Pirzada who, appearing for petitioner-lawyer M. Ilyas Khan, claimed that the NAB had not only intervened in the matter but had also recovered a big chunk of the misappropriated deposits.
The bureau was stated to be negotiating a plea bargain with the accused, Izhar Hussain Siddiqui, a retired postal employee who continued to work at the post office and receive deposits for its savings bank long after his retirement.
The bench, which consisted of Justices Zahid Kurban Alavi and Zia Perwez, also issued a notice to Attorney-General Makhdoom Ali Khan to assist the court and fixed Dec 3 as the next date of hearing.
Deputy Attorney-General Nadeem Azhar Siddiqui, who represented the respondent federal government, was asked to submit a list of the affected depositors and the deposits made by them on the next date.
Earlier, the postal department said in its comments submitted through the DAG that there was a wide discrepancy in the amounts claimed to have been deposited by the petitioners, Advocates Ilyas Khan and Izhar Haider Rizvi, and others and the entries in the official record.
The pass books produced by lawyers showed massive deposits while the record evidenced equally heavy withdrawals. For instance, Mr Khan’s pass book had entries of deposits amounting to Rs120 million while according to the official record, only Rs5,000 was outstanding against him after frequent withdrawals. In all, Rs280 million was unaccounted for in the official record.
The postal authorities said they were investigating the allegedly fraudulent transactions and all verified deposits would be refunded to the account holders. The picture would be clear only after the inquiry.
CESS ISSUE: A division bench of the Sindh High Court decided on Tuesday to dispose of intra-court appeals against the validation of infrastructure cess by a single judge within three months and restrained the provincial government from encashing bank guarantees of the appellants subject to their furnishing new guarantees in the meanwhile.
The cess, which was upheld by Justice Mushir Alam recently, is estimated to yield Rs2,300 million to the provincial government. It is leviable on all goods entering or leaving the province by air or by sea.
Importers and exporters allege that it was essentially a tax on imports and exports, which only the federal government was empowered to impose under the Constitution. The cess was first imposed in 1994 and had since been subject to litigation. The bank guarantees submitted by the importers and exporters roughly amount to Rs980 million.
Opposing any interim order in respect of the cess, Advocate-General Anwar Mansoor Khan and special government counsel Rashid A. Akhund submitted that the provincial government had to spend a huge amount on maintaining the infrastructure required for the movement of goods entering the province by air or sea. It had to make additional allocations in every sphere of human activity to ensure safe and smooth transportation of goods. It was fully competent to impose a small cess to meet the additional expenditure caused by heavy exports and imports.
The division bench, which consisted of Justices Zahid Kurban Alavi and Zia Perwez, granted interim relief to the appellants subject to strict conditions.
The appeals would be decided within three months and the appellants would not seek adjournment of hearing or otherwise delay the proceedings. They would come up for preliminary hearing on Dec 18.
Advocates Khalid Anwer, Dr Farogh Nasim, Kazim Hassan and Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui were among the lawyers who appeared for the appellants.
