May 9, 2006	Tuesday	Rabi-us-Sani 10, 1427

Please Visit our Sponsor (Ads open in separate window).

LAHORE, May 8: The Pakistan International Airlines submitted in the Lahore High Court on Monday that the federal government paid Rs16.3 million for a chartered flight to Saudi Arabia and back in July 1999. The request for a chartered plane was made by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for a flight from Karachi, which was to leave for Jaddah and Madina after collecting passengers from Islamabad and Lahore on July 15. The same flight was to return home on July 23, the PIA report submitted.

The reply was submitted in a writ petition through which advocate M D Tahir challenged the decision of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif to take about 100 PML-N leaders for the performance of Umra at the public expense at a time when he was paying a three-day official visit to the kingdom.

PIA is the only respondent to have so far submitted a reply in the writ petition filed in the beginning of the year 2000. The lawyer also made a fresh move on the identical matter when the present government also followed the suit holding the federal government, the Cabinet Division and the Foreign Office as respondents.

Justice Mohammad Akhtar Shabbir issued fresh notices to the Cabinet Division and other respondents seeking their reply in the petition which sought that the expenses incurred on Umra should be recovered from the then prime minister and the leaders benefiting from the decision. The petition would now come up for hearing after two weeks.

The PIA said in its reply that the corporation was not a party to the government decision of sending PML-N leaders for performing Umra. The airline was a commercial organisation interested in boosting its economic and business interests, it was submitted. The reply also challenged the locus atndi of the petitioner and requested the court to dismiss the petition.

Plea: Justice Mohammad Bilal Khan of the Lahore High Court on Monday referred to the chief justice a writ petition which disputed the Punjab government’s decision on banning the entry of two-stroke rickshaws on The Mall.

The court made the reference when informed that an identical writ petition was also pending adjudication before the LHC. The court requested the chief justice that the two petitions be consolidated and fixed before one bench for hearing.

Traffic wardens: Advocate M.D Tahir on Monday moved the Lahore High Court in a writ petition through which he challenged the Punjab government decision of initiating direct recruitments of traffic wardens in the traffic police equivalent to sub-inspectors.

Stating that the decision was unlawful, the lawyer-petitioner said the Police Order provided for the direct recruitment of only constables and ASIs. DPOs alone were competent to supervise the recruitment of constables and no other officer was authorised by the law to make direct recruitments.

As for ASIs, they were to be selected by the Punjab Public Service Commission after a prescribed written test and interview. No other authority was competent to recruit ASIs, he submitted.

Mr Tahir further stated that the PPSC had in January this year advertised the selection of ASIs. But the Punjab DIG (Traffic) had only last week advertised the direct recruitment of traffic wardens in the BPS-14 in five major cities of the province — Lahore, Gujranwala, Faisalabad, Multan and Rawalpindi.

The decision, he submitted, contravened the Police Order which did not envisage the recruitment in the rank above the ASI. He stated that the decision was political in nature as the Punjab government wanted to oblige its MNAs, MPAs and senators as a bribe before the next general elections.

The petitioner requested the court to issue a pronouncement that the direct recruitment of sub-inspectors was illegal.