LAHORE: A Lahore High Court official (LHC) has requested the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) to hold investigation into alleged embezzlement in employees’ welfare fund of the court.

The fund was established in 2012 with at source deduction from salary of every employee of the LHC. The fund kept increasing, however, no audit was conducted on a yearly basis, Senior Court Associate Akmal Khan said in his application to the NAB chairman.

The applicant submitted that an internal audit was conducted on repeated applications of the employees and various objections were made in the report against two alternative secretaries of the welfare fund—Additional Registrar (HR-I) Muhammad Asghar (superannuated in April 2019) and Deputy Registrar (HR-I) Nasarullah Khan Niazi.

He said the report of the internal audit discovered unfair distribution of the welfare fund by both secretaries among their employees. However, he said, no action was taken against the respondents as they have been holding key positions in the administration of the LHC.

The applicant contended that bringing the culprits to law is necessary in the interest of justice so that evil practices could be ended. He asked the NAB chairman to approve an inquiry into the matter and also file references against the respondent officers for their trial under corruption charges. A copy of the application has also been sent to chief justice of Pakistan, prime minister and administration committee of the LHC.

Published in Dawn, October 16th, 2019