Mines lease holders: PHC restrains govt from deciding old appeals

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Monday restrained till next order the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government from deciding old appeals and applications of mines and mineral lease holders under the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Minerals Sector Governance ACT, 2017.

A division bench comprising Justice Qalandar Ali Khan and Justice Muhammad Ayub Khan admitted the writ petition for full hearing filed by Frontier Mine Owners Association, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, through its president Sherbandi Khan Marwat.

The bench put on notice Advocate General of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and provincial government through secretary Mines and Minerals, directing to submit reply to the legal questions raised in the petition.

The Frontier Mine Owners Association had challenged the provincial government’s decision to apply Minerals Sector Governance ACT, 2017 on the old lease holders, who were obtained as per the Mines Law 1948 and Mines Rules 2005.

The petitioners’ lawyers, Shah Khawar and Riffat Sagheer Qureshi, submitted before the bench that the provincial government was going to deprive the mines owners from their developed mines and only wanted to give them 16 percent of the developed leased areas.

The lawyers submitted that through this act of the provincial government, the mines lease holders of the province would be deprived of billions of rupees. During arguments, the lawyers submitted that the PHC on August 17, last year had declared the KP Minerals’ Sector Governance ACT, 2016 and Rules 2017 as void and illegal.

They said the provincial government then adopted the KP Minerals’ Sector Governance ACT, 2017 and now wanted to impose the law on the old lease holders, which is clearly in violation of Articles 8(2) and 264 of Constitution as the government was taking way the rights of the petitioner under the new law.

Under the new law, the lawyers said, the provincial government had not only limited the lease holders from 6 to 4 leases to only 3 leases of mines, but also reduced their already developed mines areas from 5 Muraba kilometers to 0.75 Muraba kilometer, and thus wanted to occupy the developed mining areas from the mines owners, causing loss of billions rupees to them.

During hearing, additional advocate general provided an order of the Supreme Court, in which the apex court had asked the KP government to continue renewal of the leases and barred the sub-ordinate courts from any stay order in the matter.

After passing through the apex court order, the bench restrained the government from only deciding applications and appeals of the petitioners till next order.The bench directed the Advocate General and provincial government to submit written comments in the petition within 14 days.