LAHORE, Nov 12: The Lahore High Court chief justice on Monday directed adviser to prime minister on petroleum Dr Asim Husain to appear in person before the court and give any good reason, if he had, for his irresponsible statement to the media about a pending case against LPG Policy 2011 and subsequent petroleum levy.

Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial was hearing several petitions filed by LPG marketing/distribution companies. Barrister Aitzaz Ahsan and Advocate Shahid Hamid are leading counsels for the petitioners.

During the course of hearing, the chief justice remarked that the irresponsible statement by Dr Husain regarding instant proceedings during a television programme was cast into a sharp contrast for being utterly unfounded and uncalled for.

“The fact that the statement was made in relation to the pending judicial proceedings carries adverse implications. Accordingly Dr Asim Husain shall attend the court to answer queries in relation to his statement,” the chief justice observed and directed a deputy attorney general, present in court, to convey the order to Dr Husain and also ensure compliance.

It is to be mentioned here that Dr Husain had in his statement stated that the high court had granted a stay order at the instance of mafia against the enforcement of a tax levied under the new petroleum policy of the federal government.

The CJ adjourned hearing of the petitions till Nov 22 as counsel for the federal government sought further time to address two points that form the bedrock of the petitioner’s case.

Firstly that the Petroleum Products (Petroleum Levy) (Amendment) Act 2011 vests discretion to fix rate of petroleum levy solely in the federal government. As a result, the regulatory mechanism through Ogra in the LPG Policy 2011 for setting the rate of levy had been discarded by parliament. In the said scenario, the taxing authority (federal government) had no available guidance for the exercise of its taxing power under the statute.

Therefore, the taxing portion suffers from excessive delegation and the impugned levy could not be charged and collected on LPG by the federal government.

The second point was that under the Constitution, the Council of Common Interests (CCI) was the highest policymaking and regulatory body in relation to petroleum, natural gas and its products.

That permanent body, which convenes every quarter, had neither been consulted nor it had given an approval for the imposition of the impugned petroleum levy that was sought to be charged by the federal government.

As such it was objected that both the Amendment Act 2011 and the Finance Act, 2012 violated the constitutional mandate in the matter of charging petroleum levy without CCI sanction.

Accordingly, the petitioners prayed to declare the levy as void.