PESHAWAR, Aug 8: The Peshawar High Court on Wednesday directed the provincial local government department to comply with its order regarding the appointment of an official as director-general of the City Development and Municipal Department.

A two-member bench comprising Justice Dost Mohammad Khan and Justice Saleem Khan took exception to non-compliance of the court order and directed the concerned section officer to issue a notification about the appointment of Jan Ali as the CDMD’s director-general.

The court fixed Aug 21 for the next hearing and asked the section officer to issue a notification before that date.

The section officer said the department had moved a summary in this regard and approval was expected in the next few days.

Additional advocate-general Khusdil Khan asked for time to issue the required notification.

The bench was hearing a writ petition filed by project director Kohat Development Authority (KDA) Jan Ali, whose appointment orders had been issued by the concerned board last year.

The chairman Provincial Urban Development Board had ordered promotion of the petitioner and also directed that he should be appointed on the post as the CDMD’s director-general with immediate effect. The chairman had issued a notification in this regard on Feb 23, 2006, which was published in an official gazette on March 16, 2006. However, the notification was not implemented and the present director-general Sareer Khan was continuing on the said post, even though he was a grade 19 officer instead of the required grade 20.

The court had directed the respondents, including the provincial local government and rural development department, to implement the notification in the last hearing. The bench on Wednesday said that no further adjournments of the case would be allowed and no additional time would be given for implementation of its order.