Govt needs to protect jobs: IHC CJ

Justice Minallah says court will fully support state to ensure workers are not sacked

ISLAMABAD: Islamabad High Court Chief Justice Athar Minallah on Thursday noted that it was the government’s responsibility to play its role to protect workers from losing their jobs during the current coronavirus outbreak.

“The court will fully support the state [for this purpose],” the IHC CJ remarked while hearing a petition filed by a cement factory seeking relief in the payment of its power bill citing the financial problems it was facing due to the lockdown imposed to stem the spread of the virus.

“The government should take steps to ensure that employees of private institutions don’t lose their jobs.”

Justice Minallah directed the cement factory to pay 33% of its bill by April 15 and directed the Islamabad Electric Supply Company (IESCO) not to receive the remaining payment for now. The judge noted that the government had deferred the date for the payment of utility bills.

The court also barred the factory from sacking its workers.

It also sought a response from the IESCO and the energy ministry and adjourned the hearing till April 17.

Bank loans waiver

The IHC chief justice converted into a petition an application requesting the court to stop banks from seeking monthly loan instalments from their customers in view of the financial crisis that had emerged in the wake of the coronavirus lockdown.

The application was written by a citizen Rafiqur Rehman on a plain paper about bank staff allegedly harassing clients who were not in a position to pay back instalments because of the economic crunch.

The applicant said banks were pestering their customers whose incomes had shrunk following the cessation or slowing down of business activities after the imposition of a lockdown by provincial and federal authorities.

He requested the court either to waive the loan instalments or suspend them till the pandemic was over.

The IHC directed the court registrar to schedule the petition for hearing on Friday (today) nominating the State Bank, the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) chief and the finance secretary as respondents.

The planning ministry has estimated that 12.3 million to 18.5 million people in the country would lose their jobs and the economy would suffer Rs2 trillion to Rs2.5 trillion losses in just three months due to “moderate to severe shocks from the coronavirus outbreak”.

The ministry in an inter-ministerial meeting on April 2 discussed the preliminary estimates, which are based on information received from various government entities and initial research conducted by the Pakistan Institute of Development Economics.