Arsalan Iftikhar case: LHC judge declines to hear petition

Petition asks LHC to restrain NAB from investigating case, judge refuses to hear petition due to personal reasons.

LAHORE: Justice Sardar Tariq Masood of the Lahore High Court on Tuesday declined to hear a writ petition seeking directions to restrain National Accountability Bureau (NAB) from probing into Arsalan Iftikhar and Malik Riaz scandal, due to personal reasons.

As a division bench started its proceedings, senior judge Justice Masood pointed out that he will not sit on the bench as Arsalan’s counsel Sardar Muhammad Ishaq Khan is his brother and it will be inappropriate for him to hear the case. Following his refusal, the bench sent the case to Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial for its fixing for another division bench. Justice Syed Iftikhar Hussain Shah was the other judge on the bench.

Amanullah Bhatti, a resident of Sialkot, through his counsel Fahad Ahmad Siddiqi contended that the matter does not fall under the purview of NAB ordinance 1999 as it pertained to two individuals and has not caused any loss to the public exchequer. But NAB had formed an investigation team comprising officials of NAB, FIA, police and experts from the banking sector to probe the case.

The petitioner said that NAB had no jurisdiction to form an investigation committee on the issue as both respondents of the case did not hold any public office.

He said that the chairman NAB had already refused to entertain the case by saying that it did not fall in its ambit, but now it was ready to investigate the case on the directions of the federal government which showed the malafide intention on the part of the rulers.

He prayed to the court to issue directions for setting aside the constitution of the committee by NAB. He further prayed that the government be directed to adopt the set legal procedure to get the matter investigated from an ordinary investigation agency.

Correction: An earlier version of this story had incorrectly mentioned that the case was being referred to Chief Justice Chaudhry Iftikhar. The case has been sent back to Lahore High Court Chief Justice. The error is regretted.