Ruling: Bench suspends orders to ban entry of six political moharrars

Issues notices to VC, registrar, director of mechatronics dept at UET

PESHAWAR: A division bench of Peshawar High Court suspended the orders of the political agent of North Waziristan to ban the entry of six political moharrars into the agency.

The bench, headed by Justice Qaiser Rasheed, heard writ petitions filed by six political moharrars through their counsels Ijaz Anwar and Abdul Kareem Mehsud on Friday.

It also issued notices to the additional chief secretary and the political agent to file their replies after the petitioner challenged the ban on their entry into the agency.

Rasheed compared the political agents to pharaohs who seemed to have established their realms within tribal agencies where no one cares about the law of the land.

The counsels said they were exiled from the agency for refusing to obey the political agent’s orders. According to the attorneys, the counsels were refused entry into the agency even to meet their families and children.

Anwar said they were transferred to Bajaur Agency on June 13. At the same time, their arrest warrants were also issued. He added they were recruited on merit. Anwar argued their clients could not be banned from entering the agency as they were government servants. The counsel maintained contractual employees had been recruited on their posts.

According to Anwar, they could neither be exiled from the agency nor transferred to another agency under the law. He also billed the political agent’s order illegal and requested the bench to suspend it.

Rasheed questioned how permanent employees could be exiled and banned, and accepted the pleas. The orders were suspended.

The bench also heard another petition. It issued notices to vice chancellor, registrar and director of the Department of Mechatronics at University of Engineering and Technology, Peshawar to submit replies. The notice was issued to them after a laboratory engineer, Faiz Muhammad, claimed a non-qualified candidate was recruited for a grade-18 post.

Khalid Rahman, the petitioner’s counsel, said the applicant has been working at a grade-17 post since 2008 and applied for a post in grade-18, which was advertised in the media.

He said the petitioner was a qualified candidate who fulfilled the eligibility criteria. However, he was ignored and another candidate, who scored lower marks in the test, was recruited. Rahman said this was illegal.

The bench, after hearing the arguments, put the respondents on notice.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 13^th, 2016.