ISLAMABAD: Monday was not a good day for Water and Power Minister Khawaja Mohammad Asif who had come to the Supreme Court in connection with the LPG (liquefied petroleum gas) extraction licence case.
Advocate Irfan Qadir, representing two marketing companies Tez Gas and Pioneer Gas, accused the minister of trying to get the court involved by seeking an order in a case because being a minister he did not want to take responsibility for such decisions.
“By repeatedly appearing in courts in governmental matters the petitioner is compromising his position as minister,” the counsel said.
A three-judge bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry had taken up the petition of Khawaja Asif who as an opposition member had challenged the grant in 2003 of LPG extraction licence to Jamshoro Joint Venture Limited (JJVL) in what he called a non-transparent manner.
“Such a conduct on the part of the petitioner is neither in consonance with the constitution nor in the public interest,” Advocate Qadir said, adding that it was in fact a violation of the principle of separation of powers by a federal minister and the court should take serious notice of such a conduct.
He said he was surprised to see Khawaja Asif sitting all the time in the Supreme Court when being a minister of a very important division he should be working in his office all the time.
Irfan Qadir, who has also served as attorney general, said the petition deserved to be rejected since there had been an enormous delay in its filing. The entire case of the petitioner is based on two elements — bald allegations and violation of certain rules of PPRA. The first element itself suggested that the petitioner had not approached the court with clean hands, he said, adding that petitions were never filed in the Supreme Court on unfounded suspicion.
The counsel regretted that the petitioner wanted the court to assume upon itself the functions which the constitution or the law did not assign to judges.
“It is not the job of SC judges to carry out lengthy investigations into factual or legal aspects,” Mr Qadir said, adding that the Supreme Court was neither an investigating agency nor a court of plenary or original jurisdiction in contractual matters and such things should be decided or resolved by forums provided by the law.
Citing the case of Bahria Town’s Malik Riaz, the counsel said the court had itself held in the 2012 judgment that under Article 184 (3) of the constitution, the apex court was entitled to use its inquisitorial powers but these should be exercised sparingly.
He argued that even if the court had to exercise this extraordinary power, legal or factual questions were to be left to the competent court or forum to decide.
In the instant case, he alleged, the petitioner wanted the court to exercise this extraordinary power in violation of well-entrenched judicial precedents and to directly decide legal and factual issues by bypassing the relevant and competent legal forums.
“The petition also does not involve any question of law of public importance pertaining to violation of fundamental rights (if any) of any person. Moreover, the petition is scandalous not only as regards the respondents but it is also an attempt to influence and scandalise this honourable court,” Mr Qadir said, adding that an impression was being created that the petitioner and the court were on the same side or had a common cause.
Earlier, Advocate Muhammad Azhar Siddiqui, the counsel for Home Gas and Sehwan Gas, doubted the bona fide of the minister since he had come to the court only to target JJVL and in turn intended to award the contract allegedly to his favourites. He said the petitioner was not only a senior leader of the ruling party but also a minister for water and power and he could on his own or through his government take any action as he desired.
The counsel said Khawaja Asif was a businessman and his family members were also involved in business and they were in direct contact with business tycoons and might be shareholders.
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