CJP all praise for Shehbaz over return of Rs5.5m spent on ads

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N) president Shehbaz Sharif on Tuesday earned praise from the Supreme Court for willingly returning Rs 5.5 million he had spent on advertisements carrying his photo during his stint as Punjab chief minister. 

Headed by Chief Justice of Pakistan Mian Saqib Nisar, a bench of the apex court resumed hearing into a suo motu case pertaining to the advertising campaigns run by the provincial governments of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Punjab and Sindh in 2013-18.

The bench directed the chief secretaries of Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces to submit within 10 days details of the amount spent on advertisements put by the respective provincial governments.

The PML-N leader’s lawyer Shahid Hamid submitted a cheque for Rs 5.5 million to the bench.

At this, the CJP asked if the amount will go into the dams’ fund or the national exchequer, to which the counsel replied it would be deposited into the Punjab government’s kitty.

Shahid Hamid said the previous PML-N government had already allocated a sum of Rs 122 billion for the dam.

The amount was not paid by the party from its pocket but from the national exchequer, the top judge snapped and added in rather lighter vein that no amount has been donated for the construction of dams by the counsel’s legal firm.

The chief justice remarked Shehbaz Sharif has set an example by voluntarily returning the amount he spent on ads and asked other political leaders to follow his example.

The court disposed of the suo motu notice against the PML-N president and adjourned the hearing for ten days.