Chief Justice Isa’s remarks came during the hearing of a petition filed by the PTI ally SIC against the Peshawar High Court (PHC) ruling that denied quota of seats for women and minorities in the national and provincial assemblies.
The 13-member bench of the Supreme Court is headed by CJP Isa and also includes Justices Syed Mansoor Ali Shah, Muneeb Akhtar, Yahya Afridi, Amin Uddin Khan, Jamal Khan Mandkhail, Muhammad Ali Mazhar, Ayesha A Malik, Atal Minallah, Syed Hassan Azhar Rizvi, Shahid Waheed, Irfan Saadat Khan and Naeem Akhtar Afghan.
“PTI is a political party so why did the independent candidate leave PTI? Why did he join another party which goes against his cause and commit suicide?” the top court asked.
The CJP said that if the independent candidate had remained with the PTI, there would not have been any problem today.
After today’s hearing, the Supreme Court said that PTI leader Kanwal Shuzab’s lawyer Salman Akram Raja and SIC’s lawyer Faisal Siddiqui have completed their arguments in the case.
Notably, the PTI-backed independent candidate who won the February 8 elections joined the SIC to contest seats reserved for minorities and women, Geo News reported.
However, this did not help the party founded by Imran Khan as the Election Commission did not allot seats to the SIC for not submitting a list of candidates.
The PTI subsequently approached the Peshawar High Court over the issue, which upheld the Election Commission’s decision.
In early April, SIC head Sahibzada Hamid Raza, along with the Speaker of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly, filed a petition in the Supreme Court seeking annulment of the PHC ruling and allocation of 67 seats in parliament for women and 11 for minorities.
In May, a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court headed by Justice Mansoor Ali Shah and including Justices Muhammad Ali Mazhar and Atal Minallah suspended the PHC verdict.
The matter was then referred to a committee of judges for the formation of a larger body of judges, as the issue required constitutional interpretation.
According to a Geo News report, the Election Commission of Pakistan filed a response in the Supreme Court last week, saying SIC was not eligible to reserve seats as the party does not allow non-Muslims to participate.
The ECP informed the Supreme Court that the reserved seats cannot be allotted to the SICs as the party had not submitted its list of candidates by the deadline of January 24. (ANI)
This report has been auto-generated from ANI news service and ThePrint does not assume any responsibility for its content.
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