PESHAWAR: Peshawar High Court on Wednesday stopped Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government from utilising funds till further orders for execution of umbrella schemes in Annual Development Programme (ADP).

A bench consisting of PHC Chief Justice Ishtiaq Ibrahim and Justice Wiqar Ahmad directed the government to submit reply within three days to a petition of opposition members of the provincial assembly against the umbrella schemes in ADP.

The bench fixed Oct 10 for next hearing of the petition wherein opposition MPAs claimed that the act of the government was in violation of superior courts judgements.

The leader of opposition in provincial assembly, Ibadullah Khan, MPA Arbab Waseem Khan and 17 other opposition lawmakers have filed a joint petition, requesting the high court to declare it illegal and also set aside the schemes included in ADP under umbrella or block allocation.

PHC seeks reply to opposition MPAs’ plea against the projects

They also prayed the court to strike down all directives issued by the chief minister regarding umbrella schemes after the passage of 2024-25 annual budget.

The petitioners sought court’s orders for the government to formulate, implement and distribute developmental schemes and release funds for them in line with the law, rules, guidelines and superior court’s judgements.

They also requested the court to order authorities not to discriminate against them and sought interim relief in the form of suspension of t chief minister’s orders for umbrella schemes until the petition was decided.

The petitioners belong to opposition parties including Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-Fazl, Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians, Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf Parliamentarians and Awami National Party.

The respondents in the petition are the KP government through its chief secretary, chief minister, his principal secretary, additional chief secretary and the secretaries of finance, communication and works, irrigation, planning and development and public health engineering departments.

Lawyers Sultan Mohammad Khan and Babar Khan Yousafzai appeared for the petitioners and insisted that the ‘illegal’ actions of the respondents clearly violated the Provincial Assembly of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Procedure and Conduct of Business Rules, 1988, and KP Government Rules of Business, 1985, as well as the policy guidelines issued by the government in consequence of a high court judgement.

They said that the chief minister under the name of ‘CM Directives’ was doling out public funds to his political favourites despite the fact that such practice of arbitrary one-man discretionary power had been declared consistently illegal by superior courts including PHC.

The counsels pointed out that a table had also been given in the petition wherein 15 of the umbrella schemes had been mentioned related to upgradation and rehabilitation of roads, small drinking water supply, construction of flood protection, irrigation channels and installation of solar tubewells, district development plans for Peshawar, Charsadda, Mardan, Nowshera, Swat, Shangla, Buner, Upper and Lower Dir, Upper and Lower Chitral, Kohat, Bannu, Dera Ismail Khan and Hazara divisions.

They said that the ADP for the year 2024-25 was presented and passed in the assembly by virtue of sheer and brute majority of the government in the province.

They said that umbrella schemes were distinguishable from the projects that were presented and approved with the required details and particularity, so they were illegal.

When the bench inquired from an additional advocate general appearing for the provincial government why the government had made block allocations in the ADP when it was prohibited by the superior courts, he requested for some time for filing comments in the case.

The bench decided to put off hearing of the matter with the direction that for the time being funds should not be utilised for execution of umbrella schemes.

Published in Dawn, October 3rd, 2024