KARACHI: Sindh High Court (SHC) has sought the replies from petitioners and respondents in a petition, which challenged the undertaking allegedly sought by a bank to restrict the usage of social media by its employees.

A division bench of SHC ordered both parties to give their arguments in the petition by July 27, 2020 after a bank officers' welfare association and others filed a petition in SHC, which submitted the said undertaking is aimed at silencing and curbing the fundamental rights of members of petitioners.

The bank filed its reply in the court, which submitted the peititon is non-maintaintable as it has been filed in complete and utter disgard of the constitution and settled principles of law.

The bank stated that petitioner has only few members whereas bank has over 14,000 employees, so the association is not the representaive body of the bank's employees.

It said that said cirulcar and the undertaking sought through it are the result of policy decision taken by bank and aims to only restrict the sharing of official and confidential information and to prevent any employee from abusing the management and from passing derogatory & filthy comments/remarks and posts.

It also submitted that the undertakings, sought from the employees basically reiterate the obligations on the employees, which have already been laid down in Rules of Service, Code of Conduct and Employee Disclipinary Policy.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2020