RAWALPINDI Lahore High Court (LHC), Rawalpindi bench, Tuesday directed Federal Justice and Law Department to present before the court the record regarding grants given to different bar associations. Justice Hassan Raza Pasha also directed Secretary Law to depute an officer not less than the designation of a deputy secretary to appear before the Court on September 16 with the relevant record of distribution of grants to various bar associations. The Court issued these directions after District Bar Association (DBA) Rawalpindi filed a petition in this regard. Petitioner Advocate Malik Waheed Anjum, President DBA Rawalpindi, made Secretary Law, Secretary Ministry of Finance, Auditor General of Pakistan and Gulzar Hussain Raja, Section Officer in Law Department, as respondents. The petitioner through his lawyer Ibad-ur-Rehman Lodhi has challenged the August 26 official memorandum of the Law Ministry intimating the bar association that Rs 5,000,000 were given in grant via cheque number 25283 on April 16, 2010. The Ministry asked the DBA to furnish the expenditure statement of the amount for the purpose of audit. The petitioner contended that he as President DBA never received any grant from the incumbent government and feared the money was given to some bogus account number and the public money had been misappropriated. He said that the bar had notified it in its premise and through media that they had neither received any money nor would get such an amount because the Government through its Law Minister had started a campaign to win the support of the lawyers who were supporting independent judiciary. Challenging the method of disbursement of grants by the Law Ministry, the petitioner said under the relevant laws, Finance Division was required to provide grants in aid to Pakistan Bar Council and the relevant provincial bar councils. The bar councils further distribute the money among the associations. The petitioner said that the Federal Government through the Law Minister had been distributing public money callously in violation of relevant laws and only the favourites were being awarded. The DBA prayed to the Court to direct the Law Ministry to clarify where Rs 5,000,000 were as the money was never received by the Association. Further the manner in which the Federal Minister had been disbursing the public money among bar associations be declared unlawful and the Law Ministry should be directed to present all the record before the Court. The petitioner said that the AGP should be directed to conduct the audit of the accounts of the Law Ministry in general and particularly with reference to the amounts distributed in the garb of grants in aid.