LHC repatriates judicial officers busy with Sharifs, Sana cases

LAHORE: The Lahore High Court on Friday repatriated judicial officers busy with corruption cases of the Sharif family and a drug case against former law minister Rana Sanaullah as the federal law ministry had last week sought new nominees from the LHC.

District and Sessions Judge Masood Arshad, the presiding judge of a special court for Control of Narcotics Substance (CNS), had been stopped from working in the middle of the hearing on a bail petition filed by the former law minister. On Aug 28, the judge had returned to the court after an hour break only to inform the prosecution and the defence that he has been barred from hearing the case through a message he received on Whatsapp.

Later, the law ministry’s two days old letter written to the LHC registrar emerged showing that the services of the judge of the CNS have been repatriated to his parent department. The same latter also repatriated services of judges of two accountability courts Naeem Arshad and Mushtaq Elahi and new nominees were sought for the posts.

Judge Naeem Arshad had been hearing cases of Ramzan Sugar Mills against Leader of Opposition in National Assembly Shahbaz Sharif, his sons Hamza and Suleman. Proceedings of the Chaudhry Sugar Mills case against PML-N Vice President Maryam Nawaz and her cousin Yousaf Abbas were also pending before his court. However, D&SJ Elahi had no high profile case on his cause list.

Through three separate but similar letters issued on Friday, all the three judicial officers were asked to report to the high court. Through another notification, D&SJ Chaudhry Humayun Imtiaz has been transferred from the post of LHC registrar to Gujranwala. Director General Punjab Judicial Academy D&SJ Abdul Sattar has been posted as the registrar. D&SJ Rao Abdul Jabbar has been transferred and posted from Gujranwala to Sheikhupura while D&SJ Munir Ahmad has been transferred from Sheikhupura to Lodhran.