Ad policy: LHC gives govt one month to file reply

LAHORE: Lahore High Court (LHC) Chief Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah on Thursday accepted federal government’s request and gave it time till next month for filing reply to a petition against government’s policy on the media advertisements.

A private advertisement agency’s head, Inam Akbar, had filed the petition. Petitioner-counsel Saad Rasool alleged that the government had been running the media campaign without any uniform policy.

He said both federal and provincial governments had been distributing ads among media houses on the basis of personal liking and disliking. He also alleged that the public money had been misused for personal promotions of few individuals in the name of government advertisements.

He alleged that the governments had been influencing   editorial policies of the media houses against huge disbursement of advertisements. He said the policy of both governments was discriminatory, as such a violation of the Constitution.

He requested for summoning 10-year record of advertisements given to the print and electronic media and ask the governments to devise a uniform policy in this regard. The federal government counsel sought time to file a reply.