Balochistan CM complains to BHC CJ about judge

ISLAMABAD: Chief Minister Balochistan has demanded a “deeper probe” against a judge of the Balochistan High Court for using “inappropriate language” about the CM whom he alleged of affiliation with the intelligence agencies and dealt with his senior staff unfairly.

In a letter addressed to Chief Justice of Balochistan High Court, CM Mir Abdul Quddus Bizenjo noted that the conduct of the judge under question is against the judicial discipline and “it reflects his personal grudge against the office of Chief Minister and its officials.”

This all started from a telephone call. On May 17, CM Secretariat received a call from Baluchistan High Court wherein it was informed that Justice Kamran Mullakhel wanted to meet in his chamber three officers: Hafiz Abdul Basit (Principal Secretary to CM), Lal Jan Jaffar (Additional Secretary) and Babar Khan (PSO to CM).

The officers rushed to the apex court, according to the letter available with The News, and reached the chamber of honorable judge within 20 to 30 minutes. Upon reaching there, the officers came to know that the Additional Chief Secretary (Development) had also been summoned.

“The officers were kept in waiting outside his chamber for half an hour and when called inside the chamber, the Honorable judge misbehaved with all the three officers showing his anger on the alleged exclusion of a development scheme regarding widening of road in his neighborhood,” reads the CM letter to CJ.

The officers responded to the honorable judge that they were not aware of any such development scheme nor had they excluded it from the PSDP, the letter goes on. “But the Honorable Judge kept on expressing his anger to them and used inappropriate language about the Chief Minister and his alleged affiliation with the Intelligence Agencies,” the CM narrated the story to CJ through letter.

The honorable judge also threatened the officers with serious consequences in view of their prolonged posting in Chief Minister’s Secretariat, according to the letter. (Hafiz Abdul Basit has served as principle secretary to three CMs: Aslam khan Raisani, Sanaullah Khan Zehri and now Abdul Quddoos Bizenjo.) The officers were stunned by his behavior and did not respond to his accusations, it said.

The News verified the letter was genuine and the officers were summoned on the issue relating the alleged exclusion of development scheme. Discussions with officials privy to the incident indicates that Justice Kamran was passed on wrong information by somebody from the government that the scheme under question was approved and later on excluded. In reality, there was no such scheme to begin with and conveyed accordingly to him.

Also, the fact remains that the residence of Justice Kamran is situated on a narrow road and has been used in past for target killing. So his desire to have the road widened was due to security reasons, said an official of CM Secretariat. There is no judicial colony for judges in Quetta hence they make their own arrangements.

Incidentally, Justice Kamran was part of two-member bench that directed in March this year the elimination of all uplift schemes from PSDP (2018-19) formulated to benefit influential personalities in the province and instructed all departmental heads to include in programs only the schemes aimed at the benefitting of masses.

When I found it hard to know more facts of the issue, I contacted the Jang correspondent in Quetta who contacted quarters close to the judge. They said that though they were not authorised to speak on the issue, they would say all this stuff is concocted and baseless and is aimed to malign the judge. The accurate account of issue would be there soon, they added.