ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court on Tuesday served notices on Imran Khan, former prime minister, Asad Umar, secretary general of Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI), and Fawad Chaudhry, senior vice president of the party, in a contempt case involving Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP).
A three-judge bench — comprising Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial, Justice Ayesha A. Malik and Justice Athar Minallah — heard the petition moved by the election tribunal to club all the petitions originated out of the contempt cases against leaders of the opposition party pending before courts across the country.
During the course of proceedings, the bench remarked that the commission requested to transfer the cases to one court. The commission was of the view that at a time when they should be preparing for elections, they were busy contesting cases in courts, it added.
The chief justice said the ECP also presented a judicial precedent of merging cases with the order of the Supreme Court. The commission is invoking Article 186-A of the Constitution, he added.
According to the clause, the Supreme Court may, if it considers it expedient to do so in the interest of justice, transfer any case, appeal or other proceedings pending before any high court to any other high court.
He asked if there was an example of the decision of the Supreme Court to merge the cases of different high courts. At this, the counsel for ECP noted the Supreme Court in 1999 ordered the consolidation of income tax cases pending in various high courts.
Upon this, the chief justice said that clubbing of cases pending in different high courts must have the same point of law.
He then asked who the petitioners were in various contempt cases. The counsel replied that Khan, Chaudhry and Umar had filed cases against the ECP in several high courts across the country.
Justice Malik said the Supreme Court in the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) cases had declared that cases pending before high courts would not be clubbed.
Justice Minallah recalled the Supreme Court had clubbed all the cases pending before the high courts in the Hajj corruption case.
The ECP counsel said that cases of a similar nature might receive conflicting judgments from different courts.
Justice Malik said the apex court would decide when the conflicting decisions were challenged before the Supreme Court.
The chief justice asked under which constitutional authority did the Supreme Court order clubbing of cases pending in the different high courts. The counsel said that the injunctions of the high courts in the contempt of Election Commission case had also been challenged in the Supreme Court.
The court directed that the ECP petitions against the injunction of the high courts should also be fixed with this case.
Subsequently, the hearing of the case was adjourned for two weeks.
