LAHORE: The Lahore High Court on Thursday extended its order of “no coercive measures” against four officials of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) by an inquiry commission probing into the allegations of sexual harassment levelled against them by a complainant, Tayyaba Gul.

Justice Anwaar Hussain took up a joint petition filed by the officials besides another one by former chairman of the NAB retired justice Javed Iqbal challenging the formation of the inquiry commission.

An assistant attorney general told the court that he filed a reply on behalf of the federal government with the registrar office.

The judge directed the law officer to present the reply on the next date of hearing to be fixed by the court later.

The judge also allowed an application moved by Tayyaba Gul to become a necessary party in the case.

The petition was filed by NAB’s Deputy Director Muhammad Imran, Additional Director Kashif Masroor, Assistant Director Farrukh Hayat and Sub-Inspector (SI) Muhammad Latif.

The petitioners through counsel Safdar Shaheen Pirzada argued that the impugned notices issued to the petitioners were illegal and liable to be set aside.

He argued that all the acts done in good faith as NAB officials were protected under the law as envisaged by section 36 of the National Accountability Ordinance, 1999.

He said the ‘frivolous’ allegations were below human dignity and at the same time the purpose of the “mudslinging” by the complainant woman was only to get fame in media/social media.

The counsel asked the court to set aside the impugned notices issued by the inquiry commission to the petitioners.

On last hearing, the judge had restrained the commission from taking coercive measures against the petitioners.

The federal government had formed the commission to investigate into the allegations of “sexual offences, including assault, harassment, misconduct and misuse of authority” made by Ms Gul against former NAB chairman Javed Iqbal, DG Saleem Shahzad and others.

Published in Dawn, August 26th, 2022