PHC stays gas cess recovery from textile mills

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Tuesday stayed the Gas Infrastructure Development Cess (GIDC) arrears recovery from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa textile mills of the province through monthly bills till the next order.

A two-member bench comprising Justice Waqar Ahmad Seth and Justice Musarrat Hilali restrained the Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited (SNGPL) from collecting the GIDC arrears through monthly gas bills from KP Textile Mills of the province till the next order.

The bench passed the directions in two identical writ petitions. These were filed by All Pakistan Textile Mills Association (APTMA) through its lawyer Qazi Ghulam Dastagir.

The bench issued the notice to Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra), SNGPL and federal government through Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas to submit reply on next hearing.

During the hearing, the lawyer submitted that the courts had already stayed the GIDC from industrial units. But the SNGPL officials had been sending GIDC arrears bills since 2012.

He said under the law GIDC can be recovered from those mills and industrial units which received GIDC from consumers.

The lawyer said the petitioner did not receive the GIDC from consumers and thus to recover GIDC arrears from the KP Textile Mills was illegal and against the law.

He said that the SNGPL cannot recover the arrears in the back dates and markup can apply from the present bills.

The lawyer said the industry in KP was already on the verge of a collapse due to terrorism and imposing such arrears would force the industrialists to close down the remaining industries.