The Lahore High Court (LHC) has issued a notice to President of Pakistan in response to a petition wherein an order passed by the President against Federal Tax Ombudsman (FTO) has been challenged on the grounds that the President has no power to condone the time limitation for Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) to file appeals.
It is reliably learnt that LHC has issued the notice in a constitutional petition against the President of Pakistan, FBR and Commissioner-IR, RTO, Faisalabad, on the issue of illegal acceptance of time barred representation filed by the FBR under section 32 of the Federal Tax Ombudsman Ordinance, 2000 against an order passed by Federal Tax Ombudsman.
It is learnt that petition was moved by a taxpayer of Faisalabad RTO through Waheed Shahzad Butt Advocate, challenging the acceptance of representation by the President against the order passed by FTO Chaudhry Abdur Rauf, stating that act of the office of President is patently illegal and President of Pakistan has no power to condone the time limitation for filing of representation by the FBR against the orders passed by the FTO under FTO Ordinance, 2000.
The petition states, "Through present petition the petitioner questions the working of learned President of Pakistan as appellate authority under section 32 of the FTO Ordinance, 2000 and FBR functionaries to play with the precious resources of national exchequer (taxpayer's money) under the umbrella of powers available with Inland Revenue Services officials and ultimate wastage of taxpayer's money in futile litigation either by passing patently illegal orders or retaining taxpayer's money in shape of refunds and then defending it to save the skin of higher authorities.
"Whenever maladministration is evident, the FTO automatically acquires jurisdiction. Maladministration has a broad, inclusive definition in the FTO Ordinance and includes decisions, processes, recommendations, acts of omission or commission that are contrary to law, rules and regulations and are perverse, arbitrary, unreasonable, unjust, biased, oppressive or discriminatory. By this criteria the departmental intentional lapse of not issuing the lawful refund to the petitioner and long silence without any lawful excuse, do constitute maladministration as defined in Section 2(3) of the FTO Ordinance and, therefore, fall well within the exclusive jurisdiction of the FTO without any restraint."
It was further stated in the petition, "The order passed by the President is unconstitutional, illegal, arbitrary, discriminatory, violative of the norms of justice, blind exercise of discretionary powers, and without lawful authority, hence the same is liable to be declared unlawful and quashed. It is the duty of respondents to dispense justice and functionaries representing President are supposed to uphold the dignity of law and respect command and orders of the courts.
"It is accused that on the other hand, due to illegal acceptance of FBR vague stance on the issue of refund matters, the process of law is being abused by the Office of the President. The Office of President is involved in sheer violation of provisions of FTO Ordinance, 2000, Income Tax Ordinance, 2001 and Constitution of Islamic Republic of Pakistan, 1973, which is itself equivalent to mal-administration and denial of justice," the petitioner claimed.
The LHC order said the petitioner had assailed order dated 21.11.2016 merely for the reason that representation moved by the respondent department was barred by time for having been filed after 30 days. The counsel for the petitioner submits that office of President has no power to condone the limitation. For this submission he has placed reliance on judgement and President's own decision. The Attorney General for Pakistan on the court's call has requested for some time to seek instructions, the LHC order added.
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