The Supreme Court on Wednesday observed that it will see if contempt proceedings can be launched over ‘mis-declaration’ in the Sharif family sugar mills case.
As a three-member bench took up the Sharif family’s plea against the Lahore High Court (LHC) order directing them to move their mills out of southern Punjab, the court observed that it was being said earlier that the sugar mills were in fact power plants but the real purpose behind shifting the structures was to set up the sugar mills.
In September last year, the LHC had ordered the mills, owned by members of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif and his brother Punjab Chief Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s family, to move out of southern Punjab as they had been shifted in contravention of rules.
As the hearing started, Ittefaq Sugar Mills’ counsel Salman Akram Raja was not present in the court which led to the chief justice dismissing the mill’s appeal. As Raja later appeared in court and pleaded not to dismiss the petition, the court admonished the counsel and observed that he should be punctual. The court then retracted its order of dismissing the plea. The chief justice observed that the counsel for Waqas Sugar Mills is apparently not prepared for the case. The hearing was then adjourned for an indefinite period.
Published in Daily Times, April 19th 2018.
