Ignoring orders: PHC issues contempt notices to K-P chief secretary, others

Same bench orders irrigation secretary to reinstate services of 200 project employees.

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court issued contempt notices to the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa chief secretary along with the secretary and executive engineer of the irrigation department, ordering them to appear before a bench for violating orders.

The division bench of justices Irshad Qaiser and Syed Afsar Shah issued the notice while hearing a contempt of court petition filed by All Contractors Association through its counsel Ghulam Mohiuddin Malik.

Malik said the provincial government issued a notification on November 4, 2015, deciding that any tenders for uplift projects would be awarded to the contractor with the lowest bid. It also imposed a condition of making the payment of the contractor’s bank guarantee mandatory through cash.

He said the contractors’ association and DI Khan superintendent engineer opposed the notification, saying it violated the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Public Procurement and Regularity Authority rules.

He reminded the court the government withdrew the notification and comments were submitted before the petition was disposed of.

He maintained contracts were recently advertised and the same condition was imposed. The counsel said this was in violation of court orders and tantamount to contempt. The bench, after hearing the arguments, issued notices to the respondents.

Permanent solution

The same bench ordered the irrigation secretary to reinstate and regularise the services of around 200 project employees within 15 days or face contempt of court proceedings.

Petitioners’ counsel Imtiaz Ali said petitioners were employees of On Farm Water Management, a project of the department. They went to PHC for regularisation of their services. He said in 2011, PHC ordered the department to regularise the petitioners’ services. Ali argued the department challenged PHC verdict in the Supreme Court which upheld the order and dismissed the appeal.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 14^th, 2016.