PESHAWAR: A Peshawar High Court bench on Thursday dismissed a National Accountability Bureau petition against an accountability court`s refusal to summon six serving and former police officers for trial in a weapon procurement fraud case.

Chief Justice Mazhar Alam Miankhel and Justice Ikramullah Khan also rejected the NAB request to issue orders for the transfer of the said case from the accountability court of judge Ibrahim Khan to another in Peshawar.

After the two sides finished arguments, the bench pronounced verdict observing it rejected the petition as the relevant accountability court had yet to decide about a NAB request to reconsider its (court) decision on non-summoning of commandant of Frontier Constabulary (FC) Abdul Majeed Marwat, ex-additional IGP (operations), Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Abdul Latif Gandapur, DIG at Central Police Office, Peshawar Sajid Ali Khan, ex-DIG (headquarters), Peshawar Mohammad Suleman, ex-AIG (establishment) at CPO Kashif Alam and former DIG (telecom) Sadiq Kamal Orakzai.In March 2014, judge of the accountability court Ibrahim Khan had declined to summon the said officers observ-ing that the NAB had not clearly spelled out their role in the offence.

He had observed, `the position of the suspects has yet to be spelled out and construed by the NAB as per law and under the relevant provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure.

The judge had added that the status of the suspects was neither highlighted nor defined in the NAB reference.

However, the court had summoned four prime suspects, including former provincial police officer Malik Naveed Khan, budget officer of police Jawed Khan, former chief minister Ameer Haider Hoti`s brother Ameer Ghazan Khan and Ghazan`s brother-in-law Raza Ali.

The NAB, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa had filed a reference against 10 suspects on March 18 charging them with corruption under the NAB Ordinance, 1999.

A panel of lawyers, including Abdul Samad Khan, Mudassir Ameer, Saeed Khan Afridi and Arshad Ali, appeared before the court for the police officers in question.

They said the NAB had filed an application with the relevant accountability court praying it to reconsider its earlier order by summoning six officers to stand trial.

According to them, the NAB has filed the petition prematurely as its application has been pending decision by the court.

Samad Khan said the petition was filed by the deputy prosecutor general, whereas under the Accountability Bureau Ordinance, 1999, only the NAB chairman or the prosecutor general was em-powered to file such petitions.

He added that the petition was not maintainable.

NAB deputy prosecutor general Jamil Khan insisted the eight police officials named in the reference were in league with each other and that they had criminally designed and hatched the fraud plan, committed grave illegality, and grossly violated the provision of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Procurement of Goods, Works and Services Rules 2003 for the weapons procurement.

He said the officials in question had extended unwarranted favour to the approver in the case, Arshad Majeed, a private contractor, for the award of contracts valuing Rs5.7 billion.

Jamil said after the accountability court declined to summon the police officers, the NAB had also filed a supplementary reference in the case.

He said the roles of the said officers were clearly explained in the reference but the court still didn`t summon them to stand trial.

The NAB official said the four prime suspects were charged with receiving kickbacks for giving unjustified favour to Arshad Majeed by inflicting losses to the state exchequer, while the six police officers, who had not been summoned by the court, had facilitated the `worst corruption of its kind` being members of the relevant purchase committee.

He said the overall outcome of the evidence collected by the NAB had put the loss at Rs2.03 billion.