KARACHI: SECP powers to nominate stocks chief challenged: Stay extended against notification
KARACHI, Jan 4: The Sindh High Court adjourned on Wednesday the hearing of two petitions moved by the Karachi Stock Exchange and its two elected directors challenging a Security and Exchanges Commission of Pakistan notification for nomination of directors and chairman on the KSE board and extended the stay order against the impugned notification till Jan 18, the next date of hearing.
Advocates Rasheed A. Razvi and Yawar Farooqui filed their powers of attorney on behalf of the SECP and sought time to file rejoinders.
A division bench comprising Justices Anwar Zaheer Jamali and Nadeem Azhar Siddiqui asked the petitioners’ counsel, Muneer A. Malik and Mehmood Mandviwala, to give them copies of the petition and annexes.
Extending its interim injunction, the bench asked the counsel for the parties to exchange affidavits, counter-affidavits and comments by the next date. The parties agreed to an early disposal of the petition after preliminary hearing on Jan 18.
The petitioners say that the KSE is governed by its memorandum and articles of association, which provide for election of directors and of chairman of the board of directors. The memorandum and articles can be amended only by its general body. The SECP has no authority to force its decisions on the exchange arbitrarily. The KSE had offered a compromise formula to the SECP, which was not acceptable to the respondent commission, according to the petitions.
The SECP said in its notification and letters to the KSE that it was fully empowered to nominate directors and require that its nominee would head the exchange’s board of directors under Section 34 of the SECP Ordinance.
KARAN SUGAR MILLS: An appeal against a banking court order on the sale of Karan Sugar Mills, Sukkur, could not proceed on Wednesday as a member of the special division bench declined to hear it.
The mills, which was owned by PPP leader Islamuddin Shaikh, was purchased by a Belgian firm in an auction following a court order in a recovery suit. The auction was challenged by its directors and the second highest bidder and the case went up to the Supreme Court, which remanded it to the trial banking court.
Disposing it of, the banking court asked the directors to settle their liability with the creditor banks.
An appeal against the order was moved by the directors, which was assigned to a special bench, comprising Justices Mohammad Afzal Soomro and Nadeem Azhar Siddiqui.
The latter declined to hear the appeal and it would now be fixed before another bench.