The petitioner challenged the vires of Government of the Punjab Circular No.SO(CR&A)1-9/99, dated April 19, 1999 whereby all the Divisional Heads of the Administration were directed to take action against the illegal activities of gambling through "Parchi System" in the guise of Prize Bond Business. After due consideration of the factual and legal aspects of the matter, it is concluded that the circular was competently and lawfully issued by the Provincial Government and the petitioner has no case to urge.
2. The petitioner claims himself to be, what is popularly called, a Prize Bond Dealer. He is running business at three different places which stand enumerated in paragraph No.1 of the petition. The petition has been filed to assail the legality and validity of Circular, dated 19-4-1999 of the Government of Punjab whereby Government had directed a strict action to be taken against persons who were indulging in illegal activity of gambling through sale of bonds by means of "Parchi" system. Notice of the petition was issued to respondents. Learned counsel for the petitioner as well as learned A.A.-G. Have heard today.
3. Learned counsel for the petitioner contended that petitioner was engaged in business which was purely legal and no illegal activity of any sort was involved in business of the petitioner. It was argued that petitioner had employed certain persons at various points of business where Prize Bonds were purchased and sold to general public and that guidance and assistance to the members of the public was also provided with regard to purchase and sale of Prize Bonds. It was also submitted that the petitioner or his employees also provided assistance to members of the public in receiving Prize money from State Bank of Pakistan. It was also submitted that petitioner also allowed people having weak financial position to purchase part of Prize Bond instead of entire bond as the prize bonds became very expensive and were beyond the reach of ordinary people. It was submitted that whenever a draw was held, and luck favoured the holder of the bond, prize money was shared by the petitioner as well as the persons who had made investment in purchase of bonds and in case of being unsuccessful the investment made by any member of the public was returned and only nominal service charge was levied by the petitioner on this transaction. It was submitted that business of the petitioner did not involve any betting and provisions of laws relating to prevention of gambling were not attracted to the business of the petitioner and respondents had no authority to cause harassment to petitioner in the garb of impugned circular and that the petitioner was entitled to carry on his lawful business/trade as was guaranteed by the Constitution. Learned A.A.-G. On the other hand submitted that prize bonds cannot be sold by unauthorized persons or dealers and moreover the prize bond has to be sold at its face value which admittedly was not being done by the petitioner and moreover, the actual business of the petitioner was that prize bond was never sold by him (or other prize bond dealers) but only a certain number was sots to innocent members of the public for a small sum of money which always lost. It was submitted that prize bond dealers were engaged in defrauding the people and a large number of persons of ordinary means suffered at the hands of these peoples. It was submitted that persons of small income groups, students or other poor people are induced to purchase bond numbers without any corresponding benefit and trade of the petitioner and others, called prize bond dealers, was totally illegal and they should not be permitted on any pretext to carry on this business. Learned A.A.-G. Also submitted copy of a report submitted by Senior Superintendent of Police, Rawalpindi in connection with Writ Petitions Nos.2198 of 2000 and 2265 of 2000 to highlight the actual trade of the prize bond dealers.
4. Fraud has many faces and has been/ making appearance at our national stage in various forms and various garbs. In recent memory, Finance Corporations looted billions of rupees from general public and disappeared from the scene. Billions were taken away from the people by the Cooperative Finance Corporations which made thousands of households bereft and virtual paupers. The affectees of Taj Company are undergoing untold miseries. In that case pockets of the innocent people were accessed by employing the holy name of Islam. All these businesses, trades or activities were carried out by claiming the same to be legal and fraudsters got away by taking advantage of inadequacy of the law, the loopholes in the law, semantic quibbling and legal niceties and also due, largely, to inaction of the public functionaries concerned. The fact remains that such trade and business were unlawful and was not permitted by law of the land but nonetheless people did carry on the business and people were deprived of their life-long earnings.
For the past many years another group of people started reaching the pockets of the people by claiming that they were dealing in innocent trade of sale and purchase of prize bonds. This form of trade, as would be presently seen, is unlawful and the Government as well as this Court is under an obligation to check the unlawful activities of the unscrupulous individuals or groups. The law of land exists for the betterment of the society and for curbing of evils in the society. It has to interpreted, enforced and applied in order to obviate any illegal activity. Law cannot be permitted to be stretched in favour of the wily or the tricky. The Government is under an obligation and has the right to curb any illegal economic activity and the Constitution or the precedent does not provide any protection to a business or trade which inherently is illegal, unlawful or injurious to public-at-large.
5. Rule 3 of Prize Bonds Rules, 1999 provides as under:--
(1) These Bonds shall be issued in the denomination of two hundred rupees, seven hundred and fifty rupees, one thousand five hundred rupees, seven thousand five hundred rupees, fifteen thousand rupees and forty thousand rupees and shall be bearer type.
(2) These Bonds shall be issued at par and encashed at par any time after issue and shall be on sale at the following places, namely--
(a) offices of the State Bank of Pakistan.
(b) banks authorized in this behalf by the State Bank of Pakistan; and
(c) National Savings Centres.
6. The Prize Bond, as is evident from above, can be purchased and sold at its face value by State Bank of Pakistan or Authorized Banks only or National Savings Centres. No other person or group is authorized to sell the Prize Bonds. No doubt the Prize Bonds, which are issued under Public Debt Act, 1944, are Federal Government security and being so are considered as good as_ money but their trade is fully regularized by the State Bank of Pakistan under the Prize Bonds Rules. The Prize Bonds do not carry any interest or profit and only lots are drawn periodically and prizes are given to the winners. The non-winners can get their prize bonds encashed at face value of the bond and do not loose any money in the transaction. Petitioner claims that his business is that he sells and purchases prize bonds which obviously is not a profitable business as bonds, as claimed here are purchased or sold at. Their face value. Trading in prize bonds by individuals is simply not a business proposition as prima facie, it does not yield any profit. It has also been admitted by the petitioner that he also sells prize bonds in fractions and not as a whole. According to Prize Bond Rules, the petitioner or for that matter, any Prize Bond Dealer is not permitted to sell the prize bonds.
Fractional sale or purchase of prize bonds is also not permissible under the germane Rules. No profit is involved m this transaction either. A private person obviously would never engage in any activity in which he does not gain anything. The petitioner claims that he sells part of a prize bond which he cannot do., He claims that he provides certain services to people for purchase and sale of prize bonds. According to Prize Bonds Rules no formality is involved in purchase of bonds from the authorized dealers. No application form is required for the purpose. Anybody can walk into the State Bank of Pakistan, the authorized Bank and the National Savings Centres to purchase and/or to sell the bonds and no limit is prescribed on this sale or purchase. The collection of prize money is also absolutely simple affair and no technicalities are involved in, that and professional advice of any sort is not required by any person. It is also admitted by the petitioner that he after draw of lots of prize bonds by the State Bank of Pakistan returns the investment made by the individuals but deducts commission for the services rendered. No commission can be charged on the sale and/or purchase of prize bonds.-No such business activity is permissible under the relevant rules. No investment can be solicited from the general public without permission and sanction of the authorities. The sale and purchase of prize bonds is being employed by the so-called prize bond dealers as a facade to cover up their actual trade which really is gambling and betting as has been shown by the comments submitted by the learned A.A.-G. What the petitioner does is a form of betting and in order to dupe law enforcing agencies certain euphemisms are employed and certain covers are used to hoodwink the authorities. Basically the business of the petitioner and other prize bond dealers appears to be that they sell numbers of prize bonds to gullible members of the public who in the hope of gathering windfalls are deprived of their small purses. The business in which the petitioner or so-called prize bond dealers are engaged aims at cheating the people and betting is fully involved in the case. I am fully convinced after carefully examining the I matter that the trade in which the petitioner is involved wholly is illegal and I unauthorized, rather, the business is intrinsically criminal. The petitioner or others doing this business can be prosecuted for commission of offences under section 420, P.P.C. Read with other enabling provisions of the penal law and/or provisions of Prevention of Gambling Act (XXVIII of 1977). The impugned circular was issued by the Government competently and the public functionaries-respondent are required to enforce it.
7. The petition has no force and is dismissed.
8. Respondents Nos.2 to 7 are directed to enforce the circular, dated 19-4-1999 issued by the Government of Punjab vigorously with full force of the law at their command and they will not allow the illegal prize bonds trade to flourish in any manner. In case the illegal activities, of the petitioner or others similarly engaged in unauthorized business of prize bonds cannot be curbed by having recourse to relevant penal laws, the Deputy Commissioners of the Districts concerned shall have the authority to proceed against the so --called Prize Bond Dealers under the provisions of Maintenance of Public Order Ordinance, 1960 and they can order detention of these unscrupulous persons who continued to violate the law. The different documents which are printed at various printing presses and are utilized by the so-called Prize Bond Dealers or the petitioner in their illegal trade can also be confiscated and the printing presses involved in such activity can also be sealed by the Deputy Commissioners. A dynamic approach is required by the authorities to forestall any other tragedy like the co-opscam.
9. The petition was placed before me under the orders of another learned Bench of this Court for the reason that comments were called for, by me, in Writ Petition No.2198 of 2000 of Rawalpindi Bench of this Court. The office shall remit a copy of the order to Rawalpindi Bench to be placed on the files of Writ Petitions Nos.2198 of 2000 and 2265 of 2000 as well. In case Writ Petitions Nos.2128 of 2000 and 2265 of 2000 of Rawalpindi Bench have not been disposed of as yet, the Deputy Registrar (Judl.) of the Court shall place the file before the Honourable Senior Judge of the Bench for obtaining orders for its earlier fixation so that confusion is not caused in the , matter. It might be observed that interim orders do not stand in the way of public functionaries in the exercise of their statutory functions which lawful exercise of power is never injuncted.