KARACHI, May 23 The suspended taluka nazim of Larkana, Qurban Ali Abbasi, was reinstated by a division bench of the Sindh High Court on Saturday.

The bench comprising Chief Justice Anwar Zaheer Jamali and Justice M. Karim Khan Aga specially assembled to hear the case.

The taluka nazim was first suspended in August 2008 but was restored by the high court in April 2009.

A new notification was issued on April 24 to suspend him for another 90 days. He said in his petition that Section 132 (3) that empowered the chief minister to suspend a taluka nazim was inserted in the Sindh Local Government Ordinance, 2001, by an ordinance, which was not re-promulgated after Nov 3, 2007. Article 270-AAA of the Constitution and the Supreme Court judgment in the Tikka Iqbal case were not valid law and Section 132 (3) of the SLGO has lapsed.

For the purposes of interim relief, however, his counsel, Khalid Jawaid Khan, argued that even if Section 132 (3) was still in existence, it laid down that the chief minister could suspend a taluka nazim on the recommendation of the Sindh Local Government Commission.

The respondent government, the counsel said, had failed to produce any document showing that a formal meeting of the commission was really held. According to the 'manipulated' minutes of the meeting, the commission 'decided' to suspend and not merely 'recommended' suspension of the petitioner nazim as it should have done. Besides, there was no mention of the commission's recommendation in the summary forwarded to the chief minister for issuance of the suspension notification.

The counsel also argued that the petitioner was suspended for 96 days in August but the suspension was declared void by the high court. He has been re-suspended on the same set of allegations to circumvent the court order.

The bench suspended the impugned notification after hearing the counsel and Additional Advocate-General Sarwar Khan by an interim order and adjourned the hearing of the main petition to a date in office.