ISLAMABAD, June 17: The government on Tuesday delivered paycheques for seven months to the deposed judges of the Supreme Court, including non-functional Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry.

“These salaries were paid under the Salaries Sanction Order, 2008,” claimed Athar Minallah, a spokesman for Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, while talking to Dawn. However, law ministry sources said the salary had been sanctioned from the prime minister’s discretionary funds.

Law Minister Farooq H. Naek recently informed the National Assembly that Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani had issued directives for the payment of salary to the deposed judges.

“Through an executive order these judges have been made non-functional, from deposed, and now all that is required is another such order to make them functional,” Mr Minallah said, adding that handing over of the payslips meant impliedly that the judges were no more deposed and stood reinstated.

He said if the judges were considered as deposed ones they would have received pension. They had not only been paid salary for seven months but also permissible allowances, which were given only to non-functional judges, he added.

Mr Minallah said the paycheques mentioned the word ‘justice’ before the names of each of the judges, which negated the statement of President Musharraf that the judges who did not take the oath under the PCO ceased to hold their respective offices.

President Musharraf as the army chief had on Nov 3 sent home about 60 judges who declined to take fresh oath under the emergency rule and kept them under detention in their houses for almost 143 days.

Law Secretary Agha Rafiq delivered the cheques to Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, Justice Sardar Mohammad Raza Khan, Justice Shakirullah Jan and Justice Nasirul Mulk at their houses in the Judges Colony. The cheques of Justice Khalilur Rehman Ramday, Justice Falak Sher, Justice Tasadduq Jillani, Justice Chaudhry Ijaz and Justice Jamshed have been sent to their respective residences.Meanwhile, Advocate Hashmat Habib, chairman of the Save Judiciary Movement, described the sanction of salary from the contingency funds as “an insult to the judges” and said that such funds were meant for the needy and not judges.