PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court on Friday issued a stay order against the recovery of special election allowance paid to around 440 employees of the Election Commission of Pakistan Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Fata since 2013.

The ECP stopped the payment of that allowance to its employees lately.

A bench comprising Justice Lal Jan Khattak and Justice Roohul Ameen granted interim relief to the ECP employees until the next hearing into their joint petition against the withdrawal of the allowance and the recovery of special allowance already paid to them.

It issued notices to the respondents, including the federal government and the ECP through its secretary, asking them to explain their position on the matter.

The date of the hearing will be fixed afterwards.

Qazi Jawad Ahsanullah, lawyer for the petitioners, said the ECP in its meeting in March 2013 chaired by the then chief election commissioner and attended by all four members had decided to introduce election allowance for all employees of the commission, which was equivalent to 20 per cent of the running basic pay.

He said the federal finance secretary were also in attendance in the meeting, whose minutes were available for examination.

The lawyer said lately on the orders of the federal government, the ECP had stopped the payment of that allowance and ordered the recovery of the money already paid to the employees in an act of sheer injustice.

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“After the federal government raised some technical objections, the ECP budget wing issued a letter on Jan 15 ordering abolition of the allowance and recovery of the money already paid to the employees as allowance,” he said.

The lawyer said the payment of the said allowance was not a favour with his clients as special allowances had already been paid to different institutions and departments performing special tasks.

He said the ECP was an autonomous institution and that it had set up a separate head under which the allowance was given and for that purpose funds were also allocated.

The lawyer said the special allowance was given to employees in all grades without distinction.

The petitioners have requested the high court to declare the withdrawal of the election allowance illegal and unconstitutional, and order resumption of its payment.

The respondents in the petition are the federal government through the finance secretary, the ECP through its secretary, the provincial election commissioner, the accountant general revenue Islamabad, the assistant accountant general revenue at Peshawar sub-office, the auditor general revenue of Peshawar, and the drawing and disbursement officer of ECP Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Published in Dawn January 31st, 2015

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