SC audit reports sought through Article 19-A

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court of Pakistan faces another test on the question of transparency and this is related to its accounts.

A citizen who earlier sought information about the apex court’s staff has asked, nay, reminded the SC to act on its application through which he requested the audit reports of five years.

Mukhtar Ahmed Ali has invoked Article 19-A of the Constitution about which the SC earlier held that it could be used to obtain information from the apex court. The applicant has written to the SC, “My above-referred request for information may kindly be reconsidered and decided in the light of the recent judgment of the Honorable Supreme Court of Pakistan on civil petition No. 3532/2023.”

The referred request was made in November 2021, asking three questions. The applicant had sought the rules and regulations governing the audit of the SC’s accounts as well as the audit reports for the last five years (2015-20) ending at the time of the filing of the application. In case the audit was conducted by private firms (instead of the Auditor General of Pakistan), details of fee and compensation charges paid to the audit firms were also requested. Providing this information would be a test case for the SC, which had in the past declined to share even with the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) declaring this move an attempt to undermine the independence of judiciary. The first attempt was made by Chaudhry Nisar Ali in 2010 when he was chairman of PAC. Another effort was carried out this year by chairman PAC Noor Alam Khan (before the dissolution of the National Assembly). Neither of them succeeded, though their acts triggered debate on this issue.

When Mukhtar filed a request in 2021, the registrar’s office responded in negative. The applicant was conveyed that since the information was sought under the Right of Access to Information Act (2017), it applied on the public bodies but the apex court didn’t fall within the ambit of the said definition. “Although, the definition of Public Body provided in the Act, 2017 is very exhaustive, yet the legislature in its wisdom did not include this Court within the folds of said definition and excluded it from the purview of the Act, 2017,” reads the reply of the deputy registrar sent in January last year.

Now, when the apex court, while deciding another appeal of the same applicant, has upheld the position taken by the registrar, it has declared that SC can be approached by invoking Article 19-A of the Constitution but not through the Right of Access to Information Act (2017). Taking cue from that, Mukhtar has requested the court that his request of 2021 regarding audit reports should be treated under article 19-A. In addition, he has asked the court to deal with information under this article no matter whether the requester gives reference to that or not. Besides, he has further demanded, an officer of requisite competence may be designated to receive and decide information requests and that urgent steps may be taken to proactively disclose maximum information about the administrative matters of the court through its web portal. Information disclosed to individual citizens may also be posted on the web portal, he has further asked. “An effective mechanism for proactive disclosure of maximum information will not only ensure easy access of citizens to information but will also reduce the workload of relevant officers in deciding individual requests that they may receive in increasing numbers in future,” Mukhtar has written to the registrar.