Riba free economy appears to be a far cry

Islamabad

Jamaat Islami parliamentarian Sher Akbar Khan’s bill on elimination of riba (interest) from the national economy and banking was deferred by the National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Finance on Thursday, citing the matter was pending before a steering committee. The fact is that no such steering committee was ever constituted. It was first of three items on agenda of the standing committee which was summarily disposed of apparently due to government’s lack of preparedness.

The member National Assembly said the matter was deliberately being delayed on flimsy grounds. He announced that he will again and again put up his bill for legislation as long as the government rejects it or agree to legislate. Sher Akbar Khan MNA said he had made articles 38 and  221 of the Constitution.

Article 38, besides stressing on equitable distribution of wealth, says in Section “f” eliminate ‘riba’ as early as possible. “If the government had no intention to enforce interest free economy it should dare reject the bill instead of delaying it and putting the bill in cold storage”.

Talking to the News, Sher Akbar Khan said that the government had committed to do away with the interest from the banking system and that the matter would be handed over to a high powered steering committee, comprising leading Ulema, international experts on Islamic banking, parliamentarians and banking wizards. This commitment, according to Sher Akbar Khan, was made in the budget speech of the year 2013 by the Federal Finance Minister Ishaq Dar.

The Standing Committee on Finance was informed by the government side that the bill on elimination of ‘riba’ would be sent to the steering committee with the recommendation to expedite its work to propose mechanism to legislate as such. It may be recalled that a petition to eliminate interest from banking system in Pakistan was filed in the Supreme Court during previous tenure of Nawaz Sharif, who sought a stay order against implementation of order.

The case was transferred to the Federal Shariat Court in 2000, which is still pending for hearing though certain direction was issued by the court to the federal government to phase out the interest based economy from the banking system.

Hafiz Saeed of Tanzeem Islami had filed a similar petition in the apex court which is pending before a three judge bench.