PHC directs Revenue Dept to submit record

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Monday directed the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Revenue and Estate Department to submit record of residences allotted to officers in the provincial metropolis to find out if the allotments were made on merit or not.
A two-member bench comprising Justice Roohul Amin Khan and Justice Syed Afsar Shah directed the Estate Department to submit the complete record before next hearing on April 23.
“We want to know how the official houses are being allotted. Some officers have been waiting for years and some have got houses within months,” Justice Roohul Amin Khan observed while hearing a writ petition in which the high court’s stenographer Altaf Hussain sought allotment of house to him in the city.
His lawyer Asif Ali Shah submitted before the bench that the petitioner had applied for allotment of the house about five years ago. He said some officers had reached retirement age waiting to get a house and termed such an attitude unjust and discriminatory.
Assistant Advocate General Sikandar Ali Shah submitted before the bench that the petitioner’s name was in the waiting list and would have to wait for his turn as per policy. The bench rejected the Estate Department’s comments and directed the official to submit complete record of houses allotted in the provincial metropolis.
Meanwhile, the same bench also sought reply from the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government to explain why it did not implement its own policy on appointment of CT and SST teachers in the Education Department.
The bench asked the provincial government to reply within 14 days in a writ petition filed by Akbar Ali and others against non-implementation of the provincial government’s policy about the teachers’ appointments.
The petitioner’s lawyer Saifullah Khalil submitted before the bench that in 2010 the provincial government had adopted a new policy for the appointment of CT and SST teachers. He said the government had started four-year programme called Assistant Degree in Education (ADE) equivalent to B.A. degree and Master’s Degree in Education (MDE) equivalent to M.Sc.
He said that in 2014 the provincial government advertised the posts, but completely ignored the petitioners who had got ADE and MDE under the new programme.The court had already stayed the appointments of CT and SST teachers in the case.