In court: PTI lawmakers seek stay on disbursement of funds

SHC issued notices to the government authorities for March 11.

KARACHI: Afraid the government will spend all the funds meant for the MPAs' development schemes, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) lawmakers went to court to seek a stay order.

Advocate Khalil Ahmed Siddiqui, who represented the PTI legislators, pleaded the court restrain the authorities from diverting the funds earmarked for the PTI lawmakers for Karachi and Umerkot to other schemes until the final disposal of the petition, in which they had claimed the government was deliberately not releasing their funds. Siddiqui also requested the appointment of a Nazir to collect the funds in order to save them from being lapsed in the upcoming budget.

On Monday, the Sindh High Court (SHC) bench headed by Justice Nadeem Akhtar issued notices to the chief secretary, the planning and development additional secretary, the chief minister's principal secretary and the chief of Tameer-e-Pakistan Programme to file their replies by March 11.

The petition was filed by PTI leaders Syed Hafeezuddin, Dr Arif Alvi, Samar Ali Khan, Dr Seema Yazdani Zia, Khurram Sher Zaman and Lal Chand. The petitioners had said that the chief minister had promised an amount of Rs40 million for development schemes in the constituencies of the MPAs and MNAs of Sindh during the 2013-14 fiscal year.

Siddiqui said that his clients submitted their development schemes' proposals but they were not being processed. "The respondents have even accorded approval to the proposals and funding to the schemes suggested by the Senators of the ruling party, despite the fact that the issued notification does not provide for them," he pointed out.

"The respondents' actions are not only in violation of the notification but are also discriminatory as the funds are being released only to the approved schemes within the constituencies of the ruling party's legislators."

The respondents have infringed the petitioners' right to be treated in accordance with the law as provided in Article 4 of the Constitution, he argued, pleading the court order the authorities to allocate funds for the development schemes in their constituencies without any discrimination.

On Monday, the petitioners' lawyer requested for an early hearing of the case, which the bench approved.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 24^th, 2015.