The Islamabad High Court (IHC) issued notices to all the respondents, including the president, prime minister, secretary establishment division and secretary cabinet in the case against the removal of Lt. General (rtd.) Khalid Naeem Lodhi from his office of Secretary Defence, a private TV channel reported.
IHC said the ruling will be delivered after hearing the other parties to the case. Hearing the petition filed by Lt. General (rtd.) Khalid Naeem Lodhi against his sacking from the post of Secretary Defence, Justice Riaz Ahmed Khan issued notices to the president, the prime minister, Secretary establishment and acting defence secretary as the respondents of the case.
The petitioner pleaded the court to annul the notification of his sacking and argued that no charge sheet or a show cause notice was served for his alleged misconduct; also, no inquiry was conducted against him before termination of his service contract.
The sacked defence secretary, hitting out at the government, said the government removed him to pave its way to arbitrarily remove the chief of army staff (COAS) and director general of the Inter-Services Intelligence (DG ISI) to fulfil a ‘political agenda’ and ‘ruin the country’.
He furthermore argued in his petition that the termination of contract was a violation of fundamental rights enshrined in the Constitution.
The hearing of the case has been adjourned till February 2.
