Court orders sweeping reforms in orphanages

ABBOTTABAD:

The Abbottabad Bench of the Peshawar High Court has disposed of a writ petition challenging the election of the Governing Body of Idara Tadreesul Quran orphanage Abbottabad, while issuing an extensive set of binding directives aimed at strengthening oversight, transparency and child welfare standards in orphanages across Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.

A division bench comprising Justice Sadiq Ali and Justice Syed Muddasir Ameer heard the petition filed by Ghulam Mustafa Khan Jadoon, who had sought to have the election of the orphanage's chairman declared illegal and void.

In its judgment, the Court held that the petitioner failed to establish any legal grievance warranting the exercise of constitutional jurisdiction under Article 199 of the Constitution. The bench noted that the petitioner had not applied for membership of the orphanage's general body despite public advertisements issued prior to the election and, therefore, lacked the requisite locus standi.

Justice Sadiq Ali observed that the petitioner neither demonstrated a violation of any statutory provision nor proved that the respondents had acted beyond their lawful authority. The judgment relied on several Supreme Court precedents highlighting the strict legal requirements governing writ petitions, writs of mandamus and public interest litigation.

The Court also took serious exception to allegations levelled by one of the respondents against the petitioner's counsel, Sardar Aman Khan and Shabnam Nawaz. Terming the allegations "baseless, unfounded, and motivated," the bench ordered the offending paragraphs to be expunged from the record, observing that such assertions undermine the dignity of the legal profession and amount to an abuse of judicial proceedings.