ISLAMABAD: Eight senior officers of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) on Tuesday approached the Supreme Court to become a party in a suo motu case with the pleading that out-of-turn promotions of former military officers in the bureau were affecting their upward movement to next grades.

Headed by Chief Justice Anwar Zaheer Jamali, a three-judge SC bench will commence on Wednesday the hearing of the suo motu notice taken on an anonymous letter drawing attention of the chief justice to appointment of 16 former military officers on deputation in senior grades from BPS-20 to BPS-21.

Consequently, the chief justice had ordered that notices be issued to NAB Chairman Chaudhry Qamar Zaman and Attorney General Aushtar Ausaf, asking them to answer the allegations levelled in the letter that NAB had been violating basic service structure and service laws in appointments and promotions.

Now a fresh petition has been moved by eight regional directors — Mirza Sultan M. Saleem, Fayyaz A. Qureshi, Irfan Naeem Mangi, Abdul Hafeez Khan, Mirza Irfan Baig, Toheedul Hassan, Farmanullah and Mujahid Akbar Baloch.

All the appellants are serving in BS-20 and are posted at different stations.

Apart from the federal government through the law ministry, the establishment and cabinet secretaries, the petitioners have named as respondents retired Sqd Ldr Tariq Mehmood Nadeem, retired Maj Shahzad Saleem, retired Maj Syed Burhan Ali, retired Maj Shabbir Ahmed, retired Maj Tariq Mehmood Malik and retired Lt Col Sirajul Naeem.

The petitioners have sought a court direction against NAB for the implementation of 2013 Supreme Court judgement in which the bureau was ordered to streamline its service structure of civil servants in line with the principles laid down in the verdict.

The petition recalled that during 2003, ex-army officers, including the six officers named in the petition, were inducted into NAB as appointment by transfer under Clause 13.03, read with Clause 3.30 of NAB Employee’s Terms and Conditions of Services (TCS) Rules, 2002.

Thus, NAB clearly violated the rules by appointing these six officers who presently hold offices in BS-21, since these officers did not fulfil the requirements for appointments.Besides, they were inducted in the bureau much in excess of 10 per cent prescribed quota reserved for them at the time of their induction.

As a result of this, the future of all officers who joined NAB through a transparent, competitive process has been completely blocked, the petition said.

While the officers who were illegally inducted and in excess of their quota now occupy almost all slots of Grade 20, leaving no space/vacancies in the near future, thus

depriving a number of qualified officers of their right to legitimate expectancy for promotion, the petition argued.

The petition recalled that the 2013 judgement had affirmed that out-of-turn promotions were not only against the Constitution but also against the injunctions of Islam.

But NAB authorities did not pay any heed to the Supreme Court ruling and retained the promotions granted to the six officers out of their turn.

The petition further argued that NAB was trying to downgrade and customise the prescribed academic qualification and experience for the post of director general only to accommodate and justify the appointment of the current director general.

Published in Dawn, August 24th, 2016