PESHAWAR: A single-member Peshawar High Court bench on Thursday issued a stay order stopping the National Accountability Bureau, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, from arresting a deputy director of the Clean Drinking Water for All project in a case of multimillion rupees embezzlement in the said project.

Justice Mohammad Ghazanfar Khan directed the NAB director general to file reply to the petition filed by the deputy director, Asghar Khan, challenging the issuance of his arrest warrant.

The court directed the NAB not to take any adverse action against the petitioner until the next hearing.

Abdul Samad Khan, lawyer for the petitioner, said the federal government had launched the Clean Drinking Water for All Project in 2006 under which 986 filtration plants were to be installed in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Asks NAB to respond to petition against arrest warrant for official

He added that under the scheme, one water filtration plant was to be installed in each union council.

The lawyer said his client was appointed the project’s deputy director for monitoring filtration plants.

He said his client wasn’t given any financial powers nor was he empowered to interfere in the affairs of the project.

The lawyer said after the reports emerged about the misappropriation of project funds by the contractor, the provincial government formally asked the federal government for a probe into the matter through Federal Investigation Agency.

He said in light of the FIA inquiry, Rs100 million was recovered from the contractor tasked with installing filtration plants.

The lawyer added that the NAB later began looking into the matter and illegally issued warrants for the arrest of his client.

He claimed the FIA had already informed the NAB DG in writing that the petitioner wasn’t involved in the said corruption.

RE-ADVERTISEMENT SUSPENDED: The bench on Thursday suspended the re-advertisement of the execution of several irrigation schemes in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas and sought explanation from the Fata Secretariat additional chief secretary in a petition filed by the people earlier given contracts for those schemes.

Abdul Lateef Afridi and Khalid Khan Afridi, counsel for petitioners Faheemullah and six other government contractors, said their clients were awarded contracts of different irrigation schemes in Fata.

They said those schemes to be carried out in North and South Waziristan and Bajaur agencies and FR Bannu and FR Tank valued from Rs30 million to Rs110 million.

The lawyers said biddings for the contracts were held on Nov 7, Nov 9 and Nov 17, 2016, before their clients were given contracts for offering the lowest bids.

They said the relevant authorities also received ‘call deposits’ valuing millions of rupees from the clients.

The lawyers said after the passage of two months, the said contracts were re-advertised with his clients not knowing about the cancellation of their contracts.

They added that the authorities had also illegally withheld the ‘call deposits’ of the petitioners.

Published in Dawn, January 6th, 2017