LAHORE, Dec 20: The Lahore High Court on Monday served notices on the State Bank of Pakistan and the ministry of finance on a writ petition against virtual renouncing of coins of all smaller denominations.

Petitioner-lawyer M. D. Tahir sought an injunction against the federal government contending that stopping issuance of coins was unconstitutional and unlawful and adding to the economic hardship of the poor.

The court handed a copy of the petition to Deputy Attorney-General Dr Danishwar Malik with the direction that he should submit reports on behalf of the federal government and the SBP within one month.

This was the second petition by Mr Tahir and was based on an SBP report of Nov 30 that the coins of all denominations were legal tenders and no restriction had been imposed on their minting or circulation. The SBP, however, said the demand of coins of paisa 1, 2, 5 and 10 had come down to nil. But coins of paisas 25 and 50 continued to be minted and circulated.

The petitioner submitted that the Punjab was the only province where smaller coins were not in transaction and business and commercial concerns did not return them. As a result, the price all essential commodities was charged in rupees.

He submitted that the SBP was obliged under the Coinage Act of 1949 to arrange for the circulation of coins of all denominations which were accepted and transacted in other provinces.

The petitioner submitted that he moved an identical petition in 2001 and the Lahore High Court on Dec 18 sent it to the federal and the Punjab governments as well as the SBP for suitable action. But no action had so far been taken. Instead, the SBP had forced banks to accept and release to the public coins of one, two and five rupees. Currency notes of one and two rupees had been cancelled and the SBP was about to withdraw the currency note of Rs5 denomination.

He prayed the court to declare as illegal the SBP policy of stopping the circulation of coins and issue a direction to it to release sufficient amount of coins of all denominations to banks for a regular transaction.

ACQUITTED: A division bench of the Lahore High Court on Monday acquitted a convict in a murder case giving him the benefit of the doubt. Abdul Ghaffar and Azhar Iqbal were charged with the murder of the Faisalabad SP and his driver near Sangla Hill on July 18, 1998.