MUHAMMAD ALI MAZHAR, J.---This petition has been brought to entreat declaration that the show cause notice s dated 03.05.2017 issued by the respondent No.2 to the petitioners are without any lawful justification hence liable to be quashed. Directions have also been sought against NADRA to restore CNIC of the petitioners.
2. The ephemeral facts move forward by means of memo of petition are that the petitioners are citizens of Pakistan. Petitioner No.1 was serving as an employee of the High Court of Sindh since 15.01.1997 and retired on 30.6.2019 in BPS-10. The petitioner No.2 is a spouse of petitioner No.1. The respondent No. 2 issued Computerized National Identity Card (CNIC) and prior to the CNIC, the petitioner No. 1 was issued manual NIC on 28.04.1982 which was renewed on 25.05.2001 due to change of address. The petitioner No.1 was issued Domicile of Karachi on 18.12.1998 from the Deputy Commissioner Karachi (South). He was also issued computerized passport on 28.10.2006 and earlier he was also issued manual Passport by Respondent No.1. The petitioner No.1 was issued CNIC bearing No.42201-0563449-8 on 1.2.2013 and prior to CNIC, the petitioner No. 2 was also issued manual NIC on 7.2.1979. The petitioners received show cause notices dated 3.05.2017 from respondent No.2 that their CNICs have been blocked with the allegation that petitioners provided wrong information but no specific details were mentioned in the notices. The petitioners approached to the NADRA office and concerned staff gave them a form and instructed them to fill up the required details. The petitioners submitted all details and NADRA officials called them several times to answer queries and lastly on 25.11.2017 intimated them that their CNICs would be unblocked within a month. The petitioner No.1 never encountered any difficulties whilst using his CNIC for routine transactions but in the month of June, 2019 when the petitioner No.1 tried to withdraw money from his bank account, the staff of the bank informed him that he would need biometric verification to operate his account and when the petitioner No.1 attempted biom etric verification, the respondent No.3 (HBL) informed him that his CNIC has been blocked and the bank is unabl e to perform any transaction. The petitioners served legal notices dated 4.9.2019 and 6.9.2019 and in reply , the petitioners were asked to report to the Zonal Office of NADRA for redressal of their grievance. On 10.10.2019 the petitioners met the Deputy Director NADRA who asked them to again fill the form for "verification of suspected/not traced persons and aliens". The petitioner . No.2 was also asked to submit relevant documents and affidavit of her brother Javed Iqbal containing details of all family members which was submitted on 17.10.2019. The petitioners approached pillar to post for redress but their CNICs were not restored.
3. The learned counsel for the petitioners in the aforesaid backdrop argued that the action of the respondents is illegal and against the fundamental rights of the petitioners. There is no provision under the National Database and Registration Authority Ordinance, 2000 for blocking of CNIC. Due to this illegality , neither the petitioners can travel outside country nor operate bank accou nts which amounts to violation of fundamental rights guaranteed under Articles 9, 14, 15 and 18 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. It was further contended that the impugned notices, neither stipulated any reasons nor afforded any opportunity of hearing to the petitioners which is in violation of Article 10-A of the Constitution of Pakistan and section 24-A of the General Clauses Act hence the same are liable to be quashed with the directions to NADRA to unblock the CNICs of the petitioners.
4. The learned counsel for the NADRA referred to the reply and argued that the petitioners remained fail to prove their National Status according to the Ministry of Interior Notification dated 19.04.2017. It was further averred that the petitioner No.1 obtained his first NIC on the basis of fake particulars in the year 1982 hence his case falls in doubtful category according to Notification of Ministry of Interior dated 19.04.2017 in which the petitioners are responsible to produce residential proof prior to 1978 in Pakistan for clearance of complex case therefore, show cause notices under section 18 of NADRA Ordinance 2000 were served to provide fair opportunity for clearance but the petitioners failed to provide residential proof prior to 1978 and due to non-production of required documents, the Zonal Board of NADRA, recommended the cases to DLC for further investigation and verification ,of their National Status as per MOI notifi cation dated 19.04.2017. He reiterated that NADRA is empowered to call proof from any citizen any time under sections 23, 18 of NADRA Ordinance 2000 read with section 16-A of Pakistan Citizenship Act, 1951.
5. Heard the arguments. The nucleus of this petition is that on 03.05.2017, NADRA issued show cause notices under section 18 of the National Database and Registration Authority Ordinance, 2000 in which it was stated that the petitioners obtained CNICs on wrong information and they were called upon to submit certain documents with the cutof f date 1978 which include title documents of some land prior to 1978. Acco rding to the petitioners time and again various documents were submitted for the consideration but no action was taken and ultimately legal notices were served upon the NADRA and thereafter this petition has been filed for the redress of petitioners' grievance. In order to prove their bona fide, the petition ers have also attached certain documents with this petition. Annexure A/1 is the office order issued by Registrar of this court on 18.03.2019 which demonstrates that the petitioner No.1 was performing his duties as Driver in BPS-10 and he was sanctioned his 365 days LPR with the retirement dated 30.06.2019 on attaining the age of superannuation. Annexure A-2 is the service card issued to him by the Sindh High Court Establishment. It is further contended that the petitioner No.2 was married to one M. Siddiq Khan who expired on 14.11.2005 thereafter she married with petitioner No. 1. Copy of death certificate dated 10.01 .2013 is attached as Annexure B showing the name of her first husband. The marriage certificate of the petitioners is attached as Annexure C showing the date of marriage as 06.01.2013. Annexure D-1 is the CNIC of the petitioner No.1 which was issued on 25.06.2002 and was valid up to 30.04.2009. Two old NICs were also issued to the same petitioner . NIC issued in 1982 was renewed on 25.05.2001 due to change of address and the same are also attached as Annexures D-2 and D-3. The last CNIC (Annexure D-4) of the petitioner No.1 was issued on 20.02.2013 which was valid up to 20.02.2020. A certificate of domicile of the petitioner No.1 is attached as Annexure E which was issued on 18.12.1998. The copies of passport issued to the petitioner No.1 on 01.08.1982, 31.07.1987 and lastly on 28.10.2006 which was valid up to 27.10.201 1 are also annexed as Annexures F-1 tc F-3.
The NIC of the petitioner No.2 was issue d in the year 1989 and the CNIC was also issued to her on 01.02.2013 which was valid up tc 01.02.2020, copies of the same are attached as Annexures G-1 and G-2. All these documents have been attached in chronological order tc demonstrate that in past they were never called upon to prove their national status as citizens of Pakistan and from time to time their CNICs were renewed and the petitioner No.1 has also submitted his credentials and service record including domicile issued in 1998 and in his domicile he is shown as citizen of Pakis tan by birth. The record reflects that on 04.09.2020, the Law Officer of NADRA filed a statement that the petitioner No.1 may be directed to pursue his case before District Level Committee (DLC), South and the petitioner No.2 to visit Verification and Revoca tion (V&R) Branch, NADRA for clearance of her CNIC, however on 24.09.2020 an additional reply was also filed by NADRA in which a plea was taken that the petitioners failed to prove their national status according to the notification issued by Ministry of Interior dated 19.04.2017. It was further stated that the petitioners never visited/ appeared before the DLC for clearance of their national status and did not submit any documentary evidence, therefore, their cases are still pending before the DLC. One statement is also available on record dated 24.09.2020 which was filed by Branch Manager , HBL, High Court Road Branch, Karachi in which it was stated that due to non-compliance of the biometric verification the account of the petitioner No.1 was blocked for all debit transactions and obviously this was done as a result of blocking of petitioners CNIC by NADRA.
6. Section 18 of National Database and Registration Authority Ordinance, 2020 depicts and characterizes the powers to cancel, impound or confiscate cards. For the ease of reference, Section 18 of the aforesaid Ordinance is reproduced as under:
18. Power to cancel, impound or confiscate cards. -(1) A card issued under this Ordinance shall be the property of the Federal Government and may, by an order in writing under the seal of the Authority or an officer authorised by it in this behalf, be required to be returned and shall also be liable to be cancelled, impounded or confiscated by a like order: Provided that no order shall be made unless such person has been given notice in writing calling upon him to show cause why the order should not be made.
(2) An order under subsection (1) canceling, impounding or confiscating a card may be made only if there is reason to believe that-
(a) the card has been obtained by a person who is not eligible tb hold such card, by posing himself as eligible;
(b) more than one cards have been obtained by the same person on the same eligibility criteria;
(c) the particulars shown on the card have been obliterated or tampered with; or
(d) the card is forged.
(3) Any person in respect of whose card an order under subsection (1) has been made may, within thirty days of the order , appeal to the Federal Government against the order and the decision of the Federal Government in appeal shall be final: Provided that no order on such appeal shall be passed unless the appellant has been given an opportunity of being heard."
7. The letters of the law made it clear that the CNIC may be cancelled, impounded or confiscated only if there is a reason to believe that the card has been obtained by a person who was not eligible; duplication of card obtained by a same person; the particulars shown on the card have been obliterated or tampered with; or the card was forged. In the aftermath of cancellation, impounding or confiscation, an appeal may be filed within 30 days to the Federal Government. According to the exactitudes of Section 18 of NADRA Ordinance, any drastic and punitive action can only be taken if there is a reason to believe. The solemnity and minutiae of this provision unequivocally demonstrates that the application of this section can only be exercised by the authority if they have some reasons to believe that the card was obtained in violation of conditions mentioned in clauses (a) to (d) of subsection (2) of section 18 of the NADRA Ordinance. This cannot be put into effect as a routine exercise every time if a person applies for the renewal of his CNIC on the basis of his previous credentials or antecedents showing requisite and proper documents already in his custody to show his national status which is quite sufficient for the satisfaction of the authority but instead of examining those documents that were issued earlier to the said person, NADRA started inquiry without any cogent and substantive reason. This is not the region or raiso n detetre under the law that in each and every case Section 18 should be invoked or resort to by the authority for questioning the authenticity and genuineness of manual NIC or the earlier CNIC issued by the same department to the person who only applied for the renewal of his CNIC and nothing else. The purpose of establishing National Database and Registration Authority under the 2000 Ordinance is to provide for the registration of all person s and for the establishment and maintenance of multipurpose databases , data warehouses, networking, interfacing of databases and related facilities and services with the whole objective that a new, improved and modernized registration and database system is the emergent need of time for its multiple beneficial uses and applications in efficiently and effectively running the affairs of the State and the general public for achieving the goals of good governance, public service and minimizing scope of corruption and inef ficiency .
8. Even though, the nitty-gritties of Section 18 explicate the power to cancel, impou nd or confiscate the card as an eventual punitive action but no powers are integrated or en suite to block the CNIC of any person unless it is finally determined or adjudicated that the card issued to any such person should be cancelled, impounded or confiscated.
Before deciding the fate of show cause notices, there is no provision under the NADRA Ordinance to block CNIC.
Any such action beyond the scope of law makes a person neither here nor there being as in this case. Due to blocking of CNICs the petitioner No.1 is unable to operate his bank account which is much painful and troublesome. Nothing has been said by NADRA that the petitioners are involved in any offense or their CNIC have been blocked under some court's order or some suspicious amount is said to have been parked in their accounts through unverified source or they are suspected of any money laundering case. Despite showing off all past available record to substantiate the bona fide of the petitioners, NADRA blocked their CNICs and started fishing and roving enquiry through a show cause but the genuineness or authenticity of documents presented by the petitioners have not been questioned with the allegation that the same are forged or manipulated hence not acceptable. At this point in time what is the, status of the petitioners? Whether in this transitional or intermediary period they are supposed to have lost or deprived their citizenship of Pakistan and what would be the impending course of action in such case if the card is cancelled, impounded or confiscated? Whether any such person will be deported to somewhere else or he may be allowed to live in Pakistan with the right to apply for citizenship afresh?
Nothing was answered by the counsel for the NADRA to this effect when we raised the query to him. In fact the deprivation of citizenship is provided under Section 16 of the Pakistan Citizenship Act, 1951. For the ease of reference, Section 16 is reproduced as under: "16. Deprivation of citizenship.- (1) a citizen of Pakistan shall cease to be a citizen of Pakistan if he is deprived of that citizenship by an order under the next following subsections.
(2) Subject to the provisions of this sectio n the Federal Government may by order deprive any such citizen of his citizenship if it is satisfied that he obtai ned his certificate of domicile or certificate of naturalization [under the Naturalization Act, 1926 (VII of 1926)] by means of fraud, false representation or the concealment of any material fact, or if his certificate of naturalization is revoked.
(3) Subject to the provisions of this section the Federal Government may by order deprive any person who is a citizen of Pakistan by naturalization of his citizenship of Pakistan if it is satisfied that that citizen--
(a) has shown himself by any act or speech to be disloyal or disaf fected to the Constitution of Pakistan; or
(b) has, during a war in which Pakistan is or has been engaged, unlawfully traded or communicated with the enemy or engaged in or associated with any business that was to his knowledge carried on in such a manner as to assist the enemy in that war; or
(c) has within five years of being naturaliz ed been sentenced in any country to imprisonment for a term of not less than twelve months.
(4) The Federal Government may on an application being made or on its own motion by order deprive any citizen of Pakistan of his citizenship if it is satisfied that he has been ordinarily resident in a country outside Pakistan for a continuous period of seven years beginni ng not earlier than the commencement of this Act and during that period has neither-
(i) been at any time in the service of any Government in Pakistan or of an International Organization of which Pakistan has, at any time during that period been a member; or
(ii) registered annually in the prescribed manner at a Pakistan Consulate or Mission or in a country where there is no Pakistan Consulate or Mission at the Prescribed Consulate or Mission or at a Pakistan Consulate or Mission in a country to the country of his residence his intention to retain Pakistan citizenship.
(5) The Federal Government shall not make an order depriving a person of citizen ship under this section unless it is satisfied that it is in the public interest that the person should not continue to be a citizen of Pakistan.
(6) Before making an order under this section the Federal Government shall give the person against whom it is proposed to make the order notice in writing informing him of the grounds on which it is proposed to make the order and calling upon him to show cause why it should not be made.
(7) If it is proposed to make the order on any of the grounds specified in subsections (2) and (3) of this section and the person against whom it is proposed to make the order applies in the prescribed manner for an inquiry , the Federal Government shall, and in any other case may, refer the case to a Com mittee of inquiry consisting of a Chairman, being a person possessing judicial experience, appointed by the Federal Government and of such other members appointed by the Federal Government as it thinks proper ."
9. According to the aforesaid section, the Federal Government may by order deprive any such citizen of his citizenship if it is satisfied that he obtai ned his certificate of domicile or certificate of naturalization under the Naturalization Act, 1926 by means of fraud, false representation or the concealmen t of any material fact. It is further provided under subsection (5) that the Federal Government shall not make an order depriving a person of citizenship unless it is satisfied that it is in the public interest that the person shou ld not continue to be a citizen of Pakistan, whereas subsection (6) further provides that before making any such order the Federal Government shall issue a show cause notice to such person informing him of the grounds on which it is proposed to make the order .
Whereas under Section 17 of the same Act the Federal Government grants a certificate of domicile to any person in respect of whom it is satisfied that he has ordinarily resided in Pakistan for a period of not less than one year immediately before making an application and has acquired a domicile therein. The issuance of domicile certificate under section 17 of Pakistan Citizenship Act, 1951 read with Rule 23 of Pakistan Citizenship Rules, 1952 makes it evident that a particular person is a domicile of Pakistan. In the case of Mehmood ul Hassan Khan v. Dow University of Health Sciences (PLD 2008 Karachi 49), the learned Division Bench of this court while dilating upon the dictum laid down in the case of Joan Marg Carter v. Albert William Carter (PLD 1961 SC 616); Mehr- un-Nisa Baloch v. Appellate Com mittee (PLD 1978 Kar. 214); Muhammad Yar Khan v. Deputy Commissioner-cum-Political Agent Loralai (1980 SCMR 456) and Ziaullah v. District Magistrate Nawabsh ah (2000 CLC 406) held that expression "domicile" would reflect a person's status as a citizen of a particular state or country , whereas expression "permanent residence" D might be a pure question of fact as to his residence in a particular area.
10. According to section 3 of the Passpo rts Act, 1974, no citizen of Pakistan shall depart from Pakistan by any means whatever unless he is in possession of passport or visit a foreign country unless his passport is valid for such country . At the same time power to cancel, impound or confiscate passport is provided under Section 8 of the same Act which provides that the passport shall be the property of Federal Government and the same may be cancelled, impounded or confiscated by an order under the head of Secretary to Government of Pakistan or an authorized officer of the Federal Government, however , under subsection (2) it is provided that before making an order the Federal Government shall give such person notice in writing calling upon him to show cause why the order should not be made, however , if the Federal Government has reason to believe that a person has been engaged in subversive or in activities which are prejudicial to the interest of Pakista n or to Pakistan's relations with any foreign power , no show cause notice will be required to be issued in the above situation.
11. In the case in hand not only the petitioner No.1 produced the copy of domicile but at least two passports were issued from time to time but despite that NADRA casts doubt on his citizenship status without disclosing anything in the show cause notice as what are the reasons which led them to believe that the petitioners are not citizens of Pakistan or their earlier manual NICs were issued on some false declaration or misrepresentation. No specific allegation of any fraud shown nor any other cogent complaint has been referred to if any received by NADRA against the petitioners. Their case of renewal was delayed for a considerable period of time without any progress.
Sometimes they were called upon to appear before the District Level Committee and sometimes they appeared before the Verification and Revocation (V&R) Branch, NADRA but the fact remains that the case is lingering on at NADRA level and the fate of show cause notices has not been decided which were issued on 03.05.2017. The learned counsel for the NADRA could not point out any substantial defect in the documents produced with the petition. The past NICs and CNICs were also issued by the same department under the law so no adverse presumption can be inferred that under the doctrine of indoor management the department at that relevant time failed to apply requisite law and mind and without due diligence cards were issued to the petitioners and if so, what action has been taken against such delinquent of ficers at large scale for future deterrence.
12. Corresponding to definition provided in clause (e) of section 2 of National Database and Registration Authority Ordinance, 2000, citizen means a person who is, or is deemed to be a citizen of Pakistan, under the Pakistan Citizenship Act, 1951 and in clause (k) National Identity Card means a card issued under subsection (1) of section 14 and, where the context so admits, includes an identity card issued under the National Registration Act, 1973.
(old law). Pakistan Citizenship Act, 1951 was promulgated to make provisions for citizens of Pakistan, whereas National Database and Registration Authority Ordinance 2000 was premeditated to provide for the registration of persons and establishment and maintenance of multipurpose databases, data warehouses, networking, interfacing of databases and related facilities. Section 46 of the National Database and Registration Authority Ordinance, 2000 puts forward that this Ordinance shall have effect notwithstanding anything contained in any other law for the time being in force. What is extremely dominant and assertive to ruminate or mull over that Citizenship Act as well as the NADRA Ordinance both are special laws relating to the special subjects. The Citizenship Act pertains to the grant of citizenship of Pakistan, whereas the NADRA Ordinance, 2000 relates to the registration of persons and issuing of national identity cards according to their domain and mandate. Since both are the special laws, therefore, according to basic principle of interpretation, one special law cannot override the provisions of another special law when particularly both are governing two different aspects. The citizenship of any person cannot be confiscated and for that a particular provision is alread y provided under the law to deal the matter of confiscation for deprivation of citizenship under Section 16 of the Citizenship Act, 1951.
13: In unison, the niceties of section 9 of the NADRA Ordinance, 2000 cannot do away with which articulates the registration of citizens and its second proviso intelligibly enunciates that all citize ns who stand validly registered under any law immediately before the commencement of NADRA Ordinance shall be deemed to have been registered in the said Ordinance and their registration shall, subject to sections 17, 18 and 30 remain valid till expiry of two years from the commencement of the Ordinance or such time as may be notified by the Federal Government or till such time as such citizen is registered afresh whichever is earlier , whereas under Section 10 of the same Ordinance, the authority is required to issue or renew National Identity Cards on fulfilling the conditions as mentioned in that section but in the proviso attached to this section much emphas is has been made again that all cards issued under section 5 of the National Registration Act, 1973 to such citizens as stood registered under Section 4 of the said Act immediately before the commencement of this Ordinance shall be deemed to have been issued under this Ordinance and shall, subject to sections 17, 18 and 30 remained valid till such period as the underlying registration of the