SC to take up plea against transfer of sugar mills on Monday

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ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court on Saturday fixed February 25 as the date for the hearing of a review petition on the issue pertaining to the transfer of sugar mills owned by the Sharif family to south Punjab.

A three-judge bench comprising Justice Azmat Saeed, Justice Amir Ata Bandial and Justice Qazi Faez Isa will hear the petition on Monday.

The apex court last year had ordered the relocation of sugar mills owned by the Sharif family back to central Punjab, after declaring the relocation to south Punjab illegal.

It had ordered that Ittefaq Sugar Mills, Chaudhry Sugar Mills and Haseeb Waqas Sugar Mills should be shifted back to central Punjab within two months.

The sugar mills were relocated to south Punjab after the former provincial government amended a 2006 notification that banned the establishment of new sugar mills and the expansion and relocation of the existing ones, in 2015.

The Sharifs had moved the top court against the Lahore High Court order. The high court had declared the relocation illegal on an application filed by former Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) secretary general Jahangir Tareen.

In September 2017, the LHC had ordered the mills, owned by members of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif and his brother Shehbaz Sharif’s family, to move out of the south Punjab region.

The bench, headed by then LHC Chief Justice Mansoor Ali Shah, ordered that the Ittefaq, Haseeb Waqas, and Chaudhry sugar mills be moved back within few months.