FIR against ex-NADRA chief: IHC reserves judgment

ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad High Court on Monday reserved its judgment on a petition from the former chairman of the National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) alleging that the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) had registered a case against him on the ‘whims and wishes’ of senior officials of the of the Interior Ministry.

Justice Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui of the IHC, who was hearing the case, reserved his verdict after the prosecution and defence concluded arguments in the case.

A former chairman of the national identity record keeper Imtiaz Tajwar had claimed that he was being politically victimised while his character was also being tarnished after the FIA had filed a case against him for alleged irregularities committed in NADRA during his tenure as the body’s chairman.
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Previously, the court had asked FIA officials to explain under which law Tajwar, a grade 22 public servant, had been booked.

The court’s directions came in response to the petitioner’s stance that the investigation agency had not sought prior permission from the Federal Anti-Corruption Council for initiating an inquiry or for registering an FIR against him.

Moreover, Tajwar, through his counsel Shah Khawar, had contended that no prior permission had been sought from the President of Pakistan, who had approved the petitioner’s appointment as a deputy chairman of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB), which was a violation of the Constitution and NAB ordinance, 1999.

“Inquiry and registration of case are not only illegal from its very inception but carried out on the whims and wishes of the high-ups sitting in the echelons of the interior Ministry for reasons best known to them,” Khawar stated in the petition.

Previously, Justice Siddiqui had suspended the FIR registered against Tajwar and had restrained the FIA from investigating the chairman of a key public institution till court issues its verdict in the case.

In October 2016, the Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan had ordered the FIA to open formal investigations against Tajwar for the alleged irregularities while he led the institution.

Source: The Express Tribune