ISLAMABAD, July 8: The Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected an appeal of the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) by upholding Lahore High Court’s (LHC) order of granting an interim relief by reinstating former Test cricketer and board’s director special projects Saleem Altaf, sacked for leaking sensitive information to the media.

A three-member bench comprising Justice Faqir Mohammad Khokhar, Justice M Javed Buttar and Justice Mohammad Qaim Jan had taken up the PCB appeal against the order of the LHC that granted the interim relief to the PCB official.

Saleem, 64, was made director for special projects in 2005 after serving as chief executive of the PCB until September last year. On June 12, 2008, Saleem was fired for his alleged involvement in leaking a confidential e-mail to the media.

Prior to his termination Saleem was overseeing the 2011 World Cup.

The PCB while terminating, Saleem claimed that it chose not to extend his contract, which was due till July 7, 2008.

On the other hand, Saleem maintained that his contract was valid till the World Cup 2011.

Advocate Naeem Bokhari, the legal counsel for Saleem, argued that the president, the patron of the PCB, had appointed Saleem in 2005 and his appointment letter had no mention of any service tenure.

Issued on March 18, 2005 the letter of appointment had clearly mentioned the service rules would have no relevance to this case as he was appointed by the president.

It is only the president who can remove him from the office but the termination letter contains no approval of the patron, he stated.

Citing a letter, the counsel stated that on April 18, 2007, Saleem was re-designated as director special projects in which it was stated that he would continue to work on the digital screens installation project and could be assigned any other projects by the board at its discretion.

“You will remain on contract with the board till such time as your services are transferred to the Central Organising Committee (COC) of IPSB World Cup 2011 as executive director,” the letter said.

The case is not of restoration as the chairman cannot remove Saleem from the office, the counsel argued, adding his client was still intact to his office and should be considered as never been removed.

The PCB, he said, had not filed its statement regarding Saleem petition in the LHC which had given a tentative relief instead of the full relief, therefore let the high court decide the matter.

Meanwhile, Attorney General Malik Mohammad Qayyum representing the PCB argued that Saleem was appointed as director operations for three years and since the service rules were not applicable to any contractual jobs therefore any officer on contract could be fired at any stage.

Besides Saleem had signed the contract with the PCB and the president has nothing to do with it. Qayyum added that the high court had exceeded its jurisdiction and therefore the order of providing interim relief should be set aside.