Daily Times

Karachi: An accountability court on Saturday heard a NAB reference against former Inspector General of Police (IGP) Sindh Ghulam Haider Jamali and other police officers over alleged illegal appointments in SRP Hyderabad .

Jamali and all other accused appeared before the court. The court had set the date of August 15th to indict the top police officers in corruption reference.

At the outset of the hearing, Jamali’s counsel filed an application pleading the court to stop hearing of the reference.

The counsel took the plea that as Sindh Assembly had passed a Bill repealing applicability of NAB Ordinance in Sindh so hearing of the reference should be stopped.

He submitted that following the passage of the Bill from the Sindh Assembly, the NAB had no jurisdiction over departments and autonomous bodies controlled by the provincial government.

The counsel pleaded to the court not to indict the accused. He questioned when there was no NAB law how could the accused be indicted.

The court issued notice to NAB prosecutor on the application and adjourned further hearing till August 22nd , 2017.

The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) had filed the reference against Ghulam Haider Jamali, the former inspector general of Sindh police, and other police officers.

The former IGP and then finance AIG Fida Hussain Shah and six other police officials which have been accused of allegedly making illegal appointments by misusing their authority in the Sindh Reserve Police (SRP), Hyderabad, causing a loss of over Rs50 million to the national exchequer.

Initially, the Supreme Court had appointed three-member fact-finding committees to identify illegalities in recruitments and later, in the light of the committees` recommendations, the apex court had referred the matter to NAB to investigate it.

The reference said that former IG Jamali, AIG Shah, then training DIG Sahab Mazhar Bhalli, then Sindh Reserve Police ADIG Aitezaz Ahmed Goraya, then West SSP retired Captain Ghulam Azfar Mahesar, then Matiari district SP Amjad Ahmed Shaikh, Kashmore district SP Umar Tufail and then Tharparkar district SP Khalid Mustafa Korai were allegedly involved in illegal recruitments in the SRP, Hyderabad.

It added that some 881 appointments were made illegalay . The appointments were made against vacant posts of constables, computer operators and others.

Published in Daily Times, August 16^th 2017.