Join our Whatsapp channel
Two Supreme Court judges on Tuesday questioned why a case regarding the jurisdiction of regular benches was transferred to the constitutional bench, as the court took up contempt proceedings against its additional registrar over the same issue.
A two-judge bench, headed by Justice Mansoor Ali Shah and with the other member being Justice Aqeel Ahmed Abbasi, took up the matter today.
The case pertained to whether regular benches of the SC can determine the constitutionality of Article 191A of the Constitution, under which the constitu-tional bench was established after the 26th Amendment.
Advertisements
Video Player is loading.
Play Video Play Loaded: 3.06%
0:00
Remaining Time - -:-
Unmute
Fullscreen
This is a modal window.
The media could not be loaded, either because the server or network failed or because the format is not supported.
Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window.
Text Color WhiteBlackRedGreenBlueYellowMagentaCyan TransparencyOpaqueSemi-Transparent Background Color BlackWhiteRedGreenBlueYellowMagentaCyan TransparencyOpaqueSemi-TransparentTransparent Window Color BlackWhiteRedGreenBlueYellowMagentaCyan TransparencyTransparentSemi-TransparentOpaque
Font Size 50%75%100%125%150%175%200%300%400% Text Edge Style NoneRaisedDepressedUniformDropshadow Font Family Proportional Sans-SerifMonospace Sans-SerifProportional SerifMonospace SerifCasualScriptSmall Caps
Reset restore all settings to the default values Done
Close Modal Dialog End of dialog window.
Advertisement
X
The question arose on January 13, when a three-judge bench — comprising justices Shah, Ayesha A. Malik and Irfan Saadat Khan — heard the federal government’s petition against a Sindh High Court’s decision to strike down Section 221-A(2) of the Customs Act, 1969.
The applicant had argued that the regular bench could not hear the case as it involved challenges to the constitutionality of laws.
{try{this.style.height=this.contentWindow.document.body.scrollHeight+'px';}catch{}}, 100)" width="100%" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="height: 246px; position: relative;" src="https://www.dawn.com/news/card/1886659" sandbox="allow-same-origin allow-scripts allow-popups allow-modals allow-forms">
On Jan 16, Justice Abbasi had replaced Justice Khan as the latter was on leave. However, when the bench deferred the matter to Jan 20, Justice Shah ordered that the case be fixed before the original bench including Justice Khan. But yesterday’s hearing was presided by the bench including Justice Abbasi.
Today, Justice Ayesha was not part of the hearing as the two-member bench took up contempt proceedings against SC Addi-tional Registrar (Judicial) Nazar Abbas, which were initiated a day ago.
During the hearing, the court immediately summoned Attorney General for Pakistan (AGP) Mansoor Usman Awan for assistance. It also appointed senior counsels Munir A. Malik, a former president of the Supreme Court Bar Association, and Hamid Khan to assist the court.
Barrister Salahuddin Ahmed and Shahid Jameel, who were representing the respondents in the Customs Act case, also presented their arguments.
The majority of the hearing pertained to the judges seeking details of why the case was placed before the three-judge committee — constituted under the Supreme Court (Practice and Procedure) Act 2023 — which fixes cases for hearing.
At one point, Justice Shah remarked that once the case was fixed before the regular bench, the “committee was done with its job”.
“If the committee is taking back ongoing cases, then the judiciary’s independence has ended,” the senior puisne judge observed.
Justice Abbasi also wondered, “We do not even know what the future of the current bench would be. We are hearing the case today, [but] it’s possible this bench might not even exist tomorrow.”
The hearing was adjourned till tomorrow (Wednesday).
More to follow