LAHORE - The Lahore High Court (LHC) has taken notice of tampering with court fee (e-stamp papers) and launched a division-wise programme to train its officers to deal with the issue.
According to the documents available with The Nation, 23 cases have been registered against different suspects, including lawyers, with Old Anarkarli Police Station over fake e-stamp papers at the Lahore High Court since 2010.
The LHC Registrar Office last week issued a notification and announced a 10-day training programme for its officers and officers of the lower judiciary to deal with the issue of tampering with e-stamp papers across the province.
Special trainers, who know how to deal with online threats and tampering with e-stamp papers, which are affixed with applications and petitions moved to lower and higher courts, will train the officers.
Millions of rupees have been lost since creation of e-stamp system in 2014 as no proper mechanism was there to save the public money. Fictitious, tampered and bogus stamp papers (court fee) were being sold, attached/placed with the cause/plaints and petitions across the country, causing millions of rupees loss to the national exchequer.
Fake stamp papers and non-payment of court fee was the biggest issue for which e-stamp papers were launched and introduced, however, fake and tampering of e-stamp papers didn’t come to an end, which led the authorities to start training programme for officials.
The training is being conducted at Arfa Karim Tower and it will conclude on May 31.
Supervisory officer of (DRR Civil Section) Muhammad Akmal Khan, who has been serving at the Lahore High Court, is the whistleblower and pioneer of the e-stamp system in the country. Former LHC registrar Sardar Ahmad Naeem on April 4, 2014 also acknowledged Khan’s initiative, saying that “he was the officer who pointed out that there is no proper arrangement to verify genuineness of papers and requested that a desk of a vendor of judicial stamp papers and e-tickets might be set up on the premises of this court”.
The Punjab government framed E-Stamping Rules, 2016 in the light of the suggestions of Akmal Khan, who also pointed out the issue of illegal appointments and promotions at the Lahore High Court.
Stamp paper (court fee) is legally binding upon the litigants under High Court Rules and Orders and Stamp Act and Court Fee Act, 1870.
If a claim is more than 25,000 rupees, 15,000 rupees is legally required to sue or to file petition before competent court of jurisdiction. About 2000 petitions of different categories are moved to the Lahore High Court every month.
However, no e-ticketing system has so far been introduced by the Punjab government for revenue tickets, which are totally fictitious, bogus and fake and their value is Rs2, Rs5 and Rs10 but vendors are selling these tickets to the litigant public.
FIDA HUSSNAIN