No jurisdiction: IHC dismisses former IG’s petition, says approach FST

Zafar Abbas Lak was demoted after he ran newspaper ads at state expense to felicitate new PM.

ISLAMABAD:

The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Saturday dismissed a petition filed by a former National Highways and Motorway Police (NHMP) inspector general challenging his demotion by the prime minister.

Zafar Abbas Lak was demoted through a notification after he ordered congratulatory advertisements to be placed in different national dailies at state expense to congratulate Nawaz Sharif on his election as prime minister.

IHC Justice Noorul Haq N Qureshi rejected the petition, citing that it was beyond the purview of the IHC and asked Lak to approach the Federal Service Tribunal (FST) instead.

Lak used more that Rs1million in state funds to run the congratulatory advertisements. After his demotion, the government had also asked the ministry of communication to recover the said amount from Lak’s pension.

Lak’s Counsel Abdur Rahim Bhatti termed the demotion of his client illegal and requested the court to set aside the order.

The petitioner’s counsel maintained that the advertisements were placed with permission from of the Press Information Department (PID) and the budget was also approved.

Bhatti also claimed that the basic objective of running the advertisements was to highlight and educate the masses about projects being run by the NHA.

Rahim said that under the National Highway Safety Ordinance 2000 and the Road Safety Campaign, Performance and Reward Rules 2007, a budget of Rs100 million is allocated every year to promote different projects.

He argued that according to NHA rules, running awareness advertisements is a routine matter and the law permits it. He requested the court to declare the demotion illegal and also restrain the ministry of communication from recovering the amount from his client.

An earlier inquiry into the matter by the Federal Public Service Commission (FPSC) secretary found Lak guilty of squandering the money.

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