13-member full-court bench of SC formed to hear Sunni Ittehad Council, others pleas on women & minority reserved seats issue

ISLAMABAD, May 31 (SABAH): A 13-member full-court bench of the Supreme Court has been formed to hear pleas filed by the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) and others challenging the Peshawar High Court’s (PHC) verdict that denied the party reserved seats for women and minorities.

Chief Justice of Pakistan Qazi Faez Isa would head the bench, comprising all the available judges apart from Justice Musarrat Hilali, the sources said. Justice Hilali will not be part of the bench due to a heart ailment. The bench will hear the case on June 3 (Monday) at 11:30 AM.

The Full Court headed by CJP Justice Qazi Faez Isa and comprising Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah, Justice Munib Akhtar, Justice Yahya Afridi, Justice Amin-ud-Din Khan, Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail, Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar, Mrs. Justice Ayesha A. Malik, Justice Athar Minallah, Justice Syed Hasan Azhar Rizvi, Justice Shahid Waheed, Justice Irfan Saadat Khan and Justice Naeem Akhtar Afghan.

Sunnit Ittehad Council, through its Chairman, Faisalabad, Speaker Provincial Assembly of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Government of Khyber

Pakhtunkhwa through Chief Secretary, Peshawar, Kanwal Shauzab and others have made Election Commission of Pakistan through its Secretary, Islamabad, Shazia Tehmas Khan, Aiman Jalil Jan, Mehr Sultana and others party in 10 applications.

Attorney General for Pakistan Mansoor Usman Awan, Advocate General Balochistan, Advocate General Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Advocate General Punjab and Advocate General Sindh will appear in the court on court notice. Meanwhile Senator Farooq Hamid Naek, Senator Kamran Murtaza, Sikandar Bashir Mohmand, Salman Akram Raja, Faisal Siddiqui, Shah Khawar, Amir Javed, Asad Jan Durrani and other lawyers will appear before the full court on behalf of applicants and respondents. Secretary Election Commission of Pakistan Omar Hamid Khan, DG Law ECP and other ECP officials will also appear before the court.

Earlier this month, a three-member SC bench headed by Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah and comprising Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar and Justice Athar Minallah suspended the Election Commission of Pakistan and Peshawar High Courts verdicts and referred the matter to three-member judges’ committee for the formation of a larger bench since the matter required constitutional interpretation.

In its written order, the court stated that the questions of allocation of reserved seats in the National and provincial assemblies touch upon the foundational constitutional concept of parliamentary democracy that the voice of the electorate is truly reflected in the composition of the assemblies.

“Democratic mandate necessitates that the allocation of reserved seats enhances the representativeness of the electorate in the assemblies and upholds the principles of fairness and transparency in the electoral process. It is paramount to prioritize the integrity of the elections so that the Parliament remains a true reflection of the will of the people,” it said and granted leave to appeal.

The matter had ended up in the Supreme Court after the PHC had turned down SIC’s plea on reserved seats. 

In April, SIC Chief Sahibzada Hamid Raza as well as the speaker of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Assembly had filed appeals in the apex court against the judgment of the PHC, praying to allot the party 67 women and 11 minority seats in the assemblies, besides praying for setting aside the high court’s verdict.

Following the February 8 general elections, the Election Commission of Pakistan had decided not to allocate reserved seats for women and minorities to the SIC  as they had not submitted their list of candidates for those seats. The decision was also upheld by the PHC.

However, when the decision was challenged, Supreme Court of Pakistan suspended the PHC order.

Following the SC order, the ECP suspended the victory notifications of 77 lawmakers elected on reserved seats denied to the SIC.

Hamid Raza-led SIC gained prominence after the PTI-backed candidates — who won in the February 8 polls — joined it as their party was deprived of its electoral symbol ‘bat’.

However, PTI’s attempt to claim the reserved seats was thwarted in March when the commission ruled that the SIC was not entitled to claim quota for reserved seats “due to having non curable legal defects and violation of a mandatory provision of submission of party list for reserved seats”.

The commission not only denied the reserved seats to SIC, it distributed them among other parties.