ISLAMABAD, March 5: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Monday admitted for regular hearing a petition against the Zarai Taraqiati Bank (ZTBL) for allegedly writing off loans of influential people which caused Rs2113.69 million loss to the national exchequer.

When the division bench, comprising Chief Justice Mohammad Anwar Khan Kasi and Justice Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui, took up the petition filed by Sohail Mansoor Agha, an assistant vice-president of the bank, his counsel Mian Abdul Rauf informed the court that the ZTBL board of directors had written off the loans mostly on politically ground during 2009-10.

He said the ZTBL management misused the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP)’s policy regarding waiver/writing off of loans in genuine and deserving cases. This caused a loss of Rs2113.62 million to the national exchequer, he claimed.

He said the benefit of the SBP policy was not extended to small farmers and given only to influential businessmen who had secured loans up to Rs5 million from the ZTBL.

The petitioner also pointed out alleged irregularities in the appointment of the ZTBL board members. He said former president ZTBL Mohammad Zaka Ashraf, who is currently heading the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB), was not fit for the job because he was undergraduate and an activist of a political party.Iftikhar Khan Mohammad, a board member appointed by Mr Ashraf, was also an activist of a political party while Dr Amir Mohammad, member ZTBL, besides his affiliation with the ruling party, had reached the age of 72 years. He does not have experience in the field of banking or financial management.

Likewise, Sultan Ali Chaudhry, the ZTBL incumbent chairman, was not fit for the post. The petition said Mr Chaudhry was over 90 years of age and had no banking experience.

The petition pointed out that other members of the ZTBL board namely Zafar Iqbal, Abdul Wajid Arain, Dr Khalid Ahmed Khokhar, Mohammad Nawaz Shah and Yaqoob Vardag were also not suitable for the job.

The ZTBL board also inducted a number of retired officers on different posts. They were: Brig (retired) Sajid Hameed, Lt-Col (retd) K.B. Aleem, Lt-Col Iftikhar Ahmed, Major (retd) Mohammad Masood, Major (retired) Tassawar Gujjar, Major (retd) Alvi, deputy inspector general (retd) Ghulam Haider Marth, DIG (retd) Tahir Anwar Pasha and commissioner (retd) Abdul Ghafoor Bhatti.

The petition said the ZTBL board had recruited more than 700 officers in the bank such as chief operating officer, senior executive vice-presidents, executive vice-presidents, senior vice-presidents, assistant senior vice-presidents, vice-presidents, assistant vice-presidents, officer Grade-I, Grade-II and Grade-III in a non-transparent and clandestine manner. The petitioner requested the court to declare the appointment of the ZTBL members as illegal and order the recovery of the amount paid to them as salaries and other benefits.

The court sought reply from the BoD members as well as from Mr Zaka Ashraf and secretary finance and adjourned the hearing till a date to be fixed by the registrar office.