PHC summons official over newspapers' ad dues

The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Wednesday ordered the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Secretary Information to appear before the bench with payment cheques, citing non-compliance with earlier judicial directives regarding overdue government advertisement dues to newspapers.

A single-member bench presided over by Justice Ijaz Khan heard a contempt of court petition filed by the Council of Pakistan Newspaper Editors (CPNE), Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa chapter, through its chairman Tahir Farooq, represented by advocates Shahid Naseem Chamkani and Ahsan Masood.

During the proceedings, the court was informed that a writ petition had been filed in 2023 seeking release of approximately Rs180 crore in outstanding payments for official advertisements published in various newspapers across the province. While the provincial administration had acknowledged the dues during the writ hearing and sought additional time to clear them, the high court had disposed of the petition on May 22, 2024, with explicit orders to settle all pending amounts.

However, the CPNE counsel contended that despite the passage of significant time since the court's ruling, no payments had been released, compelling the editors' body to move contempt proceedings against the responsible officials.