The federal government has been directed to submit who authorized the investigation against the judges and under what law the government functionaries can discuss the references when those were before the Supreme Judicial Council.
Justice Umar Ata Bandial, who headed a 10-judge larger bench, at the conclusion of the proceedings asked Attorney General of Pakistan Anwar Mansoor Khan that there are two significant points before the court. Firstly, who authorized the investigation against the judges (Justice Qazi Faez Isa and Justice KK Agha, a judge of Sindh High Court) and secondly, under what law the government functionaries can announce in public about the references when those were before the Supreme Judicial Council. The attorney general said that he would respond to all the queries raised by the petitioners. He, however, sought two-week time for presenting the federal government's point of view. "I need time to consolidate the reply as for the last four months the petitioners have been arguing their case."
Around 24 identical petitions have challenged the presidential reference against Justice Qazi Faez for allegedly not disclosing his foreign properties in wealth statements. Besides the apex court judge, Pakistan Bar Council, Supreme Court Bar Association, Bar Councils & Association of Punjab, Sindh and Balochistan, and Abid Hassan Minto and IA Rehman have also filed the petitions against the Presidential Reference against Justice Qazi Faez Isa.
AGP Anwar Mansoor Khan in pursuance of the court direction filed a report. He informed that Justice Qazi Faez Isa' spouse's tax return file has been sent back to Karachi. He said that wife of Qazi Faez visited the Federal Board of Revenue on 27-01-2020, where, she stated that she had stopped filing her return as she had stopped working on 30-06-2008 and sold the property that gave her taxable income, about which information had been given by her to the RTO at Karachi.
According to the report, wife of Qazi Faez objected to the transfer of case from Karachi to Islamabad and requested for transferring it back to Karachi. It is on her request the case was transferred back to Karachi, though the transfer was unlawfully done under the provisions of sub-section 1 of Section 209 of the Income Tax Ordinance, 2001.
The report contained the letters of wife of Qazi Faez that she wrote to FBR and the reply of FBR to her. The wife of Qazi apprised that she could not file her tax declarations online under section 114 of Income Tax Ordinance, 2001, from anywhere in and outside Pakistan, and the fact of vesting of jurisdiction with tax officer or the other did not, any manner, hinder the process. The AGP report mentioned that wife of Qazi had already filed her income tax declaration for 2012, 2013, 2014 online. She was also assured that her request would be disposed of promptly as per law.
The Supreme Court on the last hearing ordered Additional Attorney General for Pakistan Amir Rehman to provide information, after verification, that Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) declined to assist Justice Qazi Faez's spouse about income tax file, transferred from Karachi to Islamabad.
Pakistan Bar Council's (PBC) counsel Salman Akram Raja had informed that it came to his knowledge that there was report in media that the petitioner's [Justice Faez] wife approached the FBR in order to obtain information about the income tax return file, transferred from Karachi to Islamabad. However, the FBR officials were not cooperative to her.
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