ISLAMABAD: The Expatriate Wing of the Human Rights Cell (HRC) of the Supreme Court has received 252 complaints since its establishment on January 10 this year.

Out of 252 complaints 49 have been disposed of and in most of the cases the grievances of the applicants have been redressed, while the remaining are under process.

Most of the overseas Pakistanis preferred to submit their complaints through email.

This was stated by the director general HRC Khalid Tippu Rana while briefing mediapersons at Supreme Court building.

Mr Khalid said the wing was established with the mandate of protecting the rights and interests of the overseas Pakistanis including right to vote, the protection of their property or any hardship they face during their visit to Pakistan.

“For the protection of such rights the wing is mandated to analyse grievances and call report from the department against which a complaint has been filed and give appropriate directions,” he said.

Most of the applications received so far are against illegal possession of properties in Pakistan, delay in decisions of cases, frauds in the plots/land purchased by overseas Pakistanis, lack of quality professional legal advice and inability to pursue their matters from abroad, Mr Khalid said.

Some of the complaints

A UK-based doctor (Muhammad Afzal) of Pakistani origin, wanted to establish a medical and dental college/university for the poor and a school for orphans at Islamabad but land mafia created problems for him.

After the Supreme Court intervention the issue has been resolved.

Another Pakistani from Saudi Arabia in his complaint said more than 3,000 Pakistanis had been languishing in deportation centre Jeddah for the last three months owing to slow process of their documents by the embassy.

Taking notice on his complaint, the Supreme Court ordered the Pakistan Consulate in Jeddah to set up a camp office at the Tehreem Deportation Centre to help expedite their repatriation.

An overseas Pakistani from Beijing complained that about 7,500 overseas Pakistanis in China are facing hardships because of non-availability of machine readable passports facility at the Pakistani Embassy.

Though the machine was installed in February 2013 at the embassy, it has not been operational because the interior ministry has not appointed a technical officer. Court has asked the interior secretary to resolve the issue.

An overseas Pakistani from United Kingdom has prayed for the arrest of the accused, who murdered his brother in January 2012 at Khoshab and escaped to Portugal.

The matter is fixed in the Supreme Court with the directions to Inspector General of Police Punjab to arrest the accused.