Supreme Court moved against SHC order on sugar mills

Govt contends IHC has already decided the matter in its favour

ISLAMABAD: The federal government has approached the apex court challenging the Sindh High Court’s order that is preventing it from taking action against sugar mill owners in line with the recommendations of an inquiry commission.

A petition has been filed by the office of the attorney general for Pakistan against the SHC’s June 22 stay order on a petition filed by sugar mills owners.

The federal government has argued as to how the owners of sugar mills could approach the SHC after the Islamabad High Court had decided the same matter.

It is also contended that the high court had no jurisdiction to stop an investigation into any matter. It is also learnt that the government has requested the apex court to hear its petition next week.’

The SHC has stopped the federal government from taking actions against the sugar mills owners who – according to an inquiry commission report – had allegedly minted billions of rupees by whipping up a sugar crisis in January this year.

The SHC division bench comprising Justice Omar Sial and Justice Zulfiqar Ali Sangi issued this order on a petition filed by various sugar mills against the inquiry commission’s forensic report that was unveiled in May this year.

The petitioners claimed that the inquiry commission was formed illegally and that its members were also part of a previous inquiry and were already prejudiced against sugar mills owners.



After hearing arguments of the petitioners, the SHC bench asked the federal government and its agencies to stop taking action against the sugar mills as it sought reply form the respondent by the next hearing of the case on June 30.

Interestingly, the IHC on June 20 allowed the government agencies to take action against the sugar barons responsible for the shortage of the commodity earlier this year and dismissed a petition requesting the court to stop a crackdown started on basis of the inquiry report.

The IHC, however, noted that the federal cabinet’s decision to delegate its functions and powers to Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Accountability Shehzad Akbar for taking action against those responsible for the sugar crisis was not in consonance with the law laid down by the Supreme Court.

The federal government had formed the inquiry commission to probe into a sudden shortage of sugar in January this year followed by a tremendous hike in price of the sweetener.

On April 5, the government unveiled the commission’s preliminary report which claimed that sugar mills belonging to the country’s top politicians including PML-N’s Shehbaz Sharif’s, PTI’s Jahangir Tareen and Khusro Bakhtiar, PML-Q’s Moonis Elahi and the Omni Group that has links with PPP leadership were among the beneficiaries of the crisis.

On May 21, the federal government shared details of the inquiry commission’s forensic report — a damning document that outlined a series of alleged misdeeds by sugar mill owners.

The alleged fraudulent activities included fudging the production cost to claim subsidies, manipulating the market, underreporting their sales, committing fraud and exploiting farmers. It claimed that the sugar barons raked in a “windfall profit” of Rs100 billion during the sugar crisis.

The Sugar Mills Association's petition states, "The federal government is using the sugar issue as a political issue to deflect attention away from its own shortcomings on several fronts and to try and gain popularity at their cost."