LAHORE The war of nerves between the Supreme Court and the government intensified on Saturday when the relevant authorities brought Zafar Qureshi back as head of the team investigating the NICL scam, as ordered by the apex court, but transferred four members of the investigating team to remote areas leaving Qureshi with no one to assist him. This compelled him (Qureshi) to write a letter to the apex court about the situation with a copy to the FIA chief. The Supreme Court had directed the FIA DG on Friday to provide full assistance to Zafar Qureshi in NICL investigations as the director general (DG) is bound to provide such assistance. Newly-restored FIA Additional Director General Zafar Qureshi while talking to TheNation said he had informed the Supreme Court and the FIA DG that how could he perform his duties well when his subordinate staff would be transferred to hard postings as punishment. After the suspension of transfer notification of Zafar Qureshi, the FIA DG issued transfer orders of four investigation team members on late Friday night which were received by the Punjab FIA via fax on Saturday. The officers who have been transferred include Deputy Director Crime Circle Syed Javed Hussain Shah, Assistant Director Anti-Corruption Circle Chaudhry Muhammad Ahmed, Assistant Director Anti-Corruption Circle Khalid Anees and Inspector Commercial Banking Circle Chaudhry Sarwar. They have transferred to Dera Ismal Khan, Turbat, Peshawar and Gwadar respectively. All the four officers met with the Punjab FIA director on Saturday in his office and they were asked to leave the charge of their offices immediately. The officers were also part of the investigation team which had raided the office of PML-Q leader Moonis Elahi and arrested his manager. Sources claimed the transfers were made to hinder the investigation process. An investigation team member seeking anonymity said all was being done to provide relief to Moonis Elahi as he had already filed a request with the court for his acquittal taking plea that his witnesses had back-tracked and there was no solid evidence against him. He said only the investigation team members were in a position to plead the case in the court as after their transfers the accused would be benefited. Another FIA officer said though Zafar Qureshi had not joined the FIA Lahore office the FIA director had directed the security staff not to let the ministerial staff of Zafar Qureshi enter the FIA office. He said it would lead to confrontation between the Supreme Court and the institutions. During hearing of the NICL scandal case, the chief justice had remarked that Zafar Qureshi had recovered Rs 1.75 billion to the national exchequer, which was record recovery in a criminal case. The chief justice had said: We are showing restraint despite the violation of its (SC) orders. The court had earlier issued notices to three federal secretaries - Interior Secretary Qamar Zaman Chaudhry, Establishment Secretary Abdul Rauf Chaudhry and Principal Secretary to Prime Minister Khushnood Lashari - for willful defiance of the apex courts order in transferring Qureshi from the NICL case.