Pay-up time? Heirs of former judge demand pension

Petitioners go to court against unpaid pension benefits by the government.

KARACHI:

The legal heirs of former Justice (retd) Ibadat Yar Khan have taken the federal ministry of law, justice and parliamentary affairs, the auditor general of Pakistan and the finance ministry to the court for allegedly failing to pay his pension benefits.

The petitioners said their father was elevated to the Federal Shariat Court in September 1988 and, on the completion of his tenure, he retired in October 1991. He passed away on November 17, 2009, according to the children.

They informed the judges that a full bench of the Supreme Court of Pakistan had delivered a judgment on March 6, 2008, declaring that the country’s top Shariat court’s chief justice and other judges are entitled to pension benefits equal to those enjoyed by other judges of the superior courts. The order was to be implemented with retrospective effect, they added.

“But the respondents have not paid the dues towards the pension of the former judge,” the petitioners pointed out, adding that the respondents are violating article 4 of the Constitution by not releasing the pension of the former judge in the shape of extending benefits of the pension.

The petitioners further stated that the former judge is being discriminated which was in sheer violation of the apex court’s judgment. They pleaded to the court to order the respondents to release the pension benefits.

On Wednesday, the standing counsel, Muhammad Ashraf Mangi, requested time to file comments in this regard. The bench, headed by Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar, ordered the SHC registrar to approach the Federal Shariat Court’s registrar and obtain the latest update regarding the entitlement and claim of the legal heirs of Justice Khan within two weeks.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 15^th, 2013.