ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court observed on Wednesday that it was being said earlier that the Sharif family's sugar mills were in fact power plants but the real purpose behind shifting the structures was to set up the sugar mills.
We will see if contempt proceedings can be carried out over misdeclaration, he observed further as athree-member bench took up the Sharif famil's plea against the Lahore High Court (LHC) order directing them to move their mills out ofsouth Punjab.
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 south Punjab as they had been shifted in contravention of rules.
As the hearing went under way today, Ittefaq Sugar Mills’ counsel Salman Akram Raja had not appeared in 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 on time.
The court then retracted its order of dismissing the plea after Raja requested the bench.
The chief justice then observed that the counsel for Waqqas Sugar Mills is not prepared for the case today.
The hearing was then adjourned for an indefinite period.
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf leader Jahangir Tareen, a South Punjab-based businessman, had taken the Sharifs to LHC over the illegal shifting of their sugar mills to South Punjab despite a ban.
At the last hearing of the case on January 11, the chief justice ordered Tareen’s counsel, Aitzaz Ahsan, to assure the court that Tareen's sugar mill will purchase the available sugarcane from farmers at the government rate.
Ahsan stated in court that the area’s five sugar mills will buy the sugarcane from the farmers.
The chief justice had observed that farmers’ interests are supreme and ordered to ensure that the farmers are paid fair and square by the mill owners.
Accepting the Sharif family's plea for hearing, the court had adjourned the case until April 18.
The court had also rejected the Sharif family’s plea to issue a stay order against the LHC decision.