KARACHI: The Sindh High Court (SHC) directed office to connect all constitutional petition filed by Muhammad Javed Hanif, former Chairman Karachi Port Trust (KPT) and others, who were involved in a case of corruption, corrupt practices and abuse of authority for illegally appointing 940 employees in Karachi Port Trust (KPT).
On October 17, 2018, a two-member bench, headed by Justice Muhammad Iqbal Kalhoro heard the matter.
During the hearing, court was informed that Rauf Akhtar Farooqi, former chairman KPT, Muhammad Iqbal and Muhmood Sharif also filed bail petitions and court may hear all the same, after the hearing, court passed order that all the bail petitions should be connected and court will hear the same together.
According to the NAB officials, Javed Hanif is involved in charges of corruption, corrupt practices and abuse of authority for illegally appointing 940 employees in KPT in connivance with [the MQM’s] Babar Ghauri, the then minister for ports and shipping.
He further argued that the appointments were made in violation of KPT law, rules and regulations “without advertisement of vacancies, competitive process, age criteria, medical examination of appointees and in violation of basic formalities”.
A large number of those appointed had a criminal record in serious cases such as “terrorism, premeditated murder and robbery” and that the illegal appointments resulted in losses to the national exchequer to the tune of Rs2.8 billion, NAB said.
