PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court on Thursday granted bail to nine currency dealers arrested this month under the Maintenance of Public Order Ordinance for hoarding the US dollars.

A bench consisting of Chief Justice Qaiser Rashid Khan and Justice Shakeel Ahmad also accepted the pre-arrest bail plea of 17 other currency dealers, who insisted that the deputy commissioner of Peshawar had issued orders for their arrest on the same charge and the Federal Investigation Agency was to take them into custody.

The bench directed petitioners to produce two surety bonds of Rs2 million each.

FIA regional director Nasir Mahmood Satti told the bench that it was revealed during a recent high-level meeting in Islamabad that 54 currency dealers from across the country, including 37 from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, were involved in the hoarding of US dollars, which caused a continuous increase in its exchange rate in the market.

PHC wonders why action over dollar hoarding not taken under relevant laws

“These elements used to purchase dollars from the market for the purpose of hoarding and after the currency’s appreciation in the market, they again floated it in the market,” he said.

The bench was hearing petitions filed by several currency dealers.

One of the petitions is filed by Habibullah Sahibzada and eight other currency dealers, who were arrested after their arrest orders were issued by Peshawar deputy commissioner on Oct 3.

Another petition was filed by Haji Mohammad Naseer and 16 other currency dealers, who feared their arrest by the FIA insisting that the officials are raiding their houses.

They claimed that the Peshawar DC had issued their arrest orders under Section 3 of the MPO, which had not been conveyed to them.

The petitioners requested the court to restrain the FIA from taking any adverse action against them.

Lawyers Shabir Hussain Gigyani, Qaiser Zaman and Azhar Yousaf appeared for the petitioners and contended that the DC had issued several orders for the arrest of their clients under the MPO in an illegal manner.

They said without applying his mind and acting in a mechanical manner, the DC had issued almost identical orders at the behest of the FIA declaring that the petitioners were involved in the dollar hoarding and black marketing and that their activities were prejudicial to public safety.

The counsel said that the DC had issued orders for the arrest of the petitioners for a period of one month under Section 3 of the MPO.

Shabir Gigyani said the FIA teams were raiding shops and houses of currency dealers without having the evidence of their involvement in any wrongdoing and were continuously harassing them.

He said the FIA had failed to recover the so-called hoarded currency from his clients.

The lawyer said instead of taking action against the petitioners under the relevant laws, including Anti-Money Laundering Act and Foreign Exchange Regulation Act, the authorities arbitrarily arrested the petitioners under the MPO.

On the court’s notice, FIA director Nasir Mahmood Satti turned up and opposed the release of the petitioners. He said the petitioners were involved in dollar hoarding and smuggling and thus, destabilising its rate in the market.

The director said in a high-level meeting held a few days ago, 54 people were identified across the country for being involved in the illegal dollar hoarding and 37 of them belonged to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, including the petitioners.

He said that due to hoarding, the US dollar’s exchange rate recently increased to Rs178 but came down to Rs173 after the activities of those people were monitored and several of them were arrested.

The bench observed that the dollar rate issue had been continuing for several years but the relevant authorities had just realised its gravity.

The bench wondered why the government didn’t take action against the petitioners under the relevant laws. The government’s representatives replied that as sentences in laws were not stringent, such suspects secured bail for release from courts easily.

The bench observed that if there were flaws in laws, the legislature should improve them instead of arresting people under the irrelevant laws.

Published in Dawn, October 8th, 2021