LAHORE, May 7: An accountability appellate bench of the Lahore High Court issued a notice to the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) in a petition challenging Hamesh Khan’s removal as Bank of Punjab president and proceedings against him for financial irregularities.
The bench, consisting of Justice Najmuz Zaman and Justice Mazhar Minhas, restrained the authorities from taking measures against Mr Khan, his counsel Ahmer Bilal Soofi said. The respondents include NAB, State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) and the inspector general. The court asked the bureau to reply in 10 days.
The petitioner asked the court to allow him access to bank record for replying to the allegations of financial irregularities.
He said only the SBP could examine the bank record and pinpoint any deviation from rules. He said the SBP was competent to remove the board of directors or the president and any official or agency could not usurp the jurisdiction of the SBP.
Petitioner’s counsel Soofi said his client was forcibly stopped from entering the bank under a letter written by the bank’s general manager. His client was not terminated from services under the BoP Act 1989.
He said neither a meeting of the board of directors of the bank was convened for his removal nor the shareholders were consulted on the extreme means.
Mr Soofi said when his client took over the bank in 2003, the youngest ever chief executive of the bank, the bank ranked at 37 out of 41 banks.
"By 2007, the bank moved up to number six because of his efforts. It developed a vast asset base of billions of rupees, which is 30 times more than what he inherited in the beginning," the counsel said. Under his stewardship, the bank got 'A' ranking by widely respected Pacra, he said.
He said the 20 top creditors of the bank were paying back the credit in time and regularly.
He said his client was not issued any notice from any agency or regulator and harassment and coercive measures against him were illegal.
"No one is giving his client the right to defend himself against the frivolous allegations and there is a deliberate attempt to discredit his work," he said.
The petition said the bank had been doing an excellent job since his client took over as president. But with the change of the government in April after the election 2008, the new officials in Punjab approached Hamesh to disclose details about loans and any facilities given to the Chaudhryes (of Gujrat). It said he had disclosed complete record to the officials that had demonstrated no loan was advanced for political reasons or under political influence. He added the officials were annoyed and threatened him with consequences.
The SBP governor was called in Lahore, where she had a meeting with former Punjab chief minister Shahbaz Sharif, it said. The petitioner said immediately after the meeting on April 23, the SBP wrote a letter to the Bank of Punjab to explain certain violations of procedure in seven days although no criminal charge was levied.
However, before a reply could be prepared, Mr Hamesh was stopped from entering his office. The petition said the board of directors had sanctioned all loans and Hamesh had no power to sanction the loan to anyone single-handedly.
The 11-member board comprised of six directors nominated by the Punjab government itself. In any case, the petition said, all loans were properly released and if due to fluctuation in the property market, if any security was slightly devalued, the SBP could direct the bank to obtain additional securities.
The petition says the SBP or NAB have failed to point out even a single irregularity and the vindictive action and harassment was causing unnecessary panic among the shareholders and the depositors - leading to a plunge in the share price.