LAHORE, Oct 2: The Lahore High Court on Thursday sought a reply from the State Bank of Pakistan on a petition challenging a circular through which all scheduled banks were directed to furnish personal information to the Central Board of Revenue regarding all depositors being paid an annual profit of Rs10,000 and above.

Justice Mohammed Ghani directed deputy attorney-general Sher Zaman Khan to update the court about the SBP’s response within two weeks.

Petitioner-lawyer M.D. Tahir had pleaded that the SBP had bound the presidents of all scheduled banks on June 30 last to furnish information to the CBR on a biannual basis regarding the name, address, NID card number and the amount of profit paid to the depositor.

He contended that such instructions were unfair and against the public interest as it would shatter the latter’s faith since any information relating to an account was a secret between the bank and the account holder. He feared that the disclosure of this information would result in heavy taxation and penalties imposed by the CBR and the business community would be the most affected class.

“This circular is even worse than the law which froze dollar accounts and is likely to be used as a tool by the CBR to harass the public. It has been issued in violation of the banking laws and is liable to be set aside on this ground,” the petitioner submitted, adding that bank deposits would drastically fall since 50.75 per cent of the total deposits of the banks came from undisclosed sources of income.