Recent increase in prices of petroleum products came into question before the apex court as it has been urged to declare the raise as violation of fundamental rights in larger interest of the public. After the recent revision, the price of petrol has been increased by Rs 4.06 per litre, light diesel by Rs 6.29 per litre, high speed diesel by Rs 3.96 per litre and kerosene oil by Rs 6.79 per litre. With the current increase, per litre petrol price has reached to Rs 81.53, kerosene Rs 64.32 per litre, light diesel oil Rs 58.37 per litre and high speed diesel's new price is Rs 89.91 per litre.
Filing petition under Article 184 (3) of the Constitution, the petitioner made Federation through secretary Cabinet Division, secretary Finance Division, secretary Ministry of petroleum, and Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority as respondents. Challenging the raise, Moulvi Iqbal Haider requested the Supreme Court on Tuesday to declare the increase unconstitutional and issue directives to concerned authorities to restore petroleum prices effected on December 31, 2017.
Terming the increase as an act of gross violation of constitutional provisions, the petitioner said the people of Pakistan are being directly affected with the unconstitutional raise of petroleum products. Substantiating his claim, the petitioner submitted that obviously prices of other utilities will automatically increase due to raise in petroleum products, saying his plea is about public importance for which the apex court being guarantor of the fundamental rights of the citizen may determine, examine and consider under the constitutional provisional in the matter in hand.
That the federal government awarded gift to the public on first January 2018 increased prices of petrol, diesel, kerosene oil and light diesel of the petroleum products. He said the Article 77 of the Constitution provides guarantee that no tax shall be imposed upon the people of Pakistan without presentation of mini bill before the Parliament, adding that government under the cover of Finance Act delegated power to the OGRA to increase/recommend the prices on their sole discretion.
However, he submitted that the Prime Minister on his discretion can either approve/disapprove or amend the recommendation of the OGRA, adding that the Ministry of Finance announced the same for implementation of the prices which are unjust, unfair arbitrary and against the mandate of the people of Pakistan.
The petitioner was of the view that without debate in the Parliament over the recommendation of OGRA would be a mini-budget which is against Articles 80 and 81 of the constitution. He claimed that during the tenure of present government, prices of petroleum products increased around 18 times under which the government earned more than Rs 300 billion.
The petitioner said that middle class people are directly affected due to hike prices in the petroleum products under which prices of other products automatically increase and no one is answerable as to why the government is not making the polices to control the prices of the other day to day products.
Seeking the court's direction for protection of fundamental rights of citizens of Pakistan in the matter, the petitioner said the respondents are not competent to increase the petroleum prices on their sole discretion unless the purposed recommendation of the prices is approved through the Parliament.
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