ISLAMABAD: Justice Athar Minallah of the Islamabad High Court (IHC) issued a notice to the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) chairman in response to a petition seeking contempt of court proceedings against the PTA chief for not implementing court orders regarding unregistered SIMS.

On December 10, 2014 Justice Minallah had directed the PTA chairman to take action on a petition filed against unregistered SIMS within a month.

The petitioner claimed that 1.5 million illegal, unregistered SIMS of local and foreign mobile phone companies are operational in Pakistan. He said many of them are being used by terrorist networks for crimes against the state and its people such as extortion, blackmail, bomb blasts, kidnapping for ransom and illegal Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP).

He alleged that despite having knowledge of all these activities the PTA has not paid heed to the issue despite clear directions by the IHC.

The counsel pointed out that the respondents have committed contempt of court. Further hearings have been adjourned until a date is announced by the registrar office.

Published in Dawn, January 24th, 2015

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