ISLAMABAD - Federal Minister for Finance Ishaq Dar Monday approached the Islamabad High Court (IHC) against his indictment in an illegal assets reference by an accountability court.
A division bench of the IHC comprising Justice Athar Minallah and Justice Miangul Hassan Aurangzeb will take up this petition moved by Dar today (Tuesday).
In his petition, the federal finance minister prayed before the court to set aside the accountability court’s order passed on September 27, and stay the trial until the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) files the final reference in the matter.
Dar moved the court through his counsel Khawaja Haris Advocate and cited judge Accountability Court (AC) No 1 Islamabad and the NAB as respondents.
The petitioner stated that on September27, he filed an application before the AC judge for postponing the framing of charges on the grounds that the said charges should only be framed after seven days of provision of copies of the reference to the accused including the investigation report.
He added that after hearing the arguments of the parties, the AC judge had dismissed the application on the ground that the law mandated the framing of charges within seven days of provision of documents to the accused, and the seven days after provision of the documents to the accused was not mandatory.
The federal minister contended that the said order was passed in breach of Article 4 of the Constitution of Pakistan, which inter alia mandated that every citizen should be dealt in accordance with the law. He argued that the framing of charge without observing mandatory provision of law was in breach of principle of fair trial as guaranteed by the Constitution of Pakistan.
“The petitioner’s right to fair trial is further compromised by the fact that (the) copy of (the) charge sheet has yet not been provided to (the) petitioner, while (the) reference is fixed for the recording of the evidence of the prosecution on October 4. As such the petitioner is likely to be seriously prejudiced firstly on account that he has been deprived of right of raising any objection to framing of charge and secondly on account that statement of prosecution witnesses are going to be recorded without the petitioner having been duly apprise(d) of the contents of the charge to which he has to answer (to) and in the light of which he has to cross-examine the prosecution witnesses,” adopted the minister.
The finance minister further claimed that the accountability court had indicted him without giving him the mandated time to file his response.
He said the impugned order was illegal and without lawful authority, hence the same was liable to be set-aside.
Therefore, the finance minister prayed before the court to accept his petition and set aside the AC’s order dated September 27, and he may be given adequate opportunity to raise objection to the framing of charge and its contents before calling and recording of the prosecution witnesses.
He further requested the court that till final adjudication of the petition, the proceedings before the AC’s judge might be stayed.