PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court on Tuesday disposed of around 100 petitions of Afghan nationals with Proof of Registration cards or Afghan Citizen Cards, who claimed to be Pakistan citizens and sought certificates of Pakistani citizenship for themselves.

A bench consisting of Justice Wiqar Ahmad and Justice Mohammad Ijaz Khan directed that the National Database and Registration Authority should look into the cases of the petitioners in accordance with the policy or SOPs formulated by authorities for the purpose.

It also directed authorities not to harass or deport petitioners, including several women as well, until their cases were decided.

The bench announced that it would release a detailed judgement on the points raised by petitioners and it would include directives for authorities, including Nadra.

The petitioners mostly claimed that they were Pakistani citizens but were registered as Afghan refugees for different purposes. They added that they were either issued ACC or POR cards by Nadra.

The petitioners said that the government considered them Afghan nationals and didn’t issue Pakistan computerised national identity cards.

Advocate Saifullah Muhib Kakakhel was the lead counsel for the petitioners, whereas Nadra director Shahid Ali, director (legal) Abdul Rauf, assistant director (legal) Shahid Gigyani and other officers also appeared before the bench.

Mr Kakakhel argued that merely by issuing ACC or PoR card to a person, the government couldn’t deny his or her Pakistani citizenship.

He contended that by merely acquiring ACC or PoR card a Pakistani citizen couldn’t be declared as an Afghan national.

Mr Kakakhel said that one petitioner,Lal Pari,was a Pakistani citizen but was married to an Afghan.

He added that the woman’s children were given PoR cards, so the government wasn’t issuing them the certificate of Pakistani citizenship.

The bench directed petitioners to provide the required documents in accordance with the government’spolicy or SOPs to Nadra.

It asked Nadra to issue the required certificate for the issuance of Pakistani identity cards to those who meet SOPs.

During the hearing, the bench observed that earlier the ministry of interior had to decide the said issues related to doubtful citizenship, but it did not have a proper procedure to handle all those cases. However, it observed that since Nadra had been empowered, things had improved.

The Nadra’s director informed the bench that the Zonal Verification Board had been established to resolve the issues related to Afghan refugees. He said that ACC and PoR cards were canceled on the instructions of Nadra and the Ministry of State and Frontier Region (Safron).

He pointed out that those persons who had an old passport of 1979 or other authentic documents, which could prove their Pakistani citizenship, were issued clearance certificates by Nadra for citizenship.

Abdul Rauf said that under a one-window operation, cases were verified by Nadra before being sent to Safron.

The bench observed that facilities should be provided to the people as people in large numbers had been approaching the high court in such cases.

It added that such an arrangement be made that officials of Nadra, Safron and that of the interior ministry be present at the same place for deciding these matters.

The official said that in the past in case of doubts about citizenship an applicant had to approach the ministry of interior, which was empowered under section 19 of the Citizenship Act to issue the certificate to him that he was a citizen of Pakistan.

He said that Nadra was given the powers to issue the certificate, with such cases being dealt with on the basis of the formulated SOPs.

Published in Dawn, September 3rd, 2025