The PPP made the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC), the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP), and others parties in the petition filed by Farooq H. Naek.

The petition argued that the apex court judges while pronouncing the judgment in the case, did not properly look at the facts.

The petition read it was the SIC, not the PTI, which had demanded the reserved seats, adding: “But the court instead gave these seats to the PTI.”

The PPP prayed to the court to take its verdict back.

It is to be noted here that on July 12, the Supreme Court declared that the PTI was a parliamentary party eligible for reserved seats, overturning the verdicts of the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) and the Peshawar High Court (PHC) denying reserved seats to the party.

A 13-judge full court of the Supreme Court, headed by Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Qazi Faez Isa, pronounced the majority verdict with an 8-5 vote, declaring the ECP’s allocation of reserved seats to the ruling coalition unconstitutional.

Justice Mansoor Ali Shah, Justice Munib Akhtar, Justice Yahya Afridi, Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail, Justice Athar Minallah, Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar, Justice Aminuddin Khan, Justice Ayesha Malik, Justice Hasan Azhar Rizvi, Justice Shahid Waheed, Justice Irfan Saadat Khan, and Justice Naeem Akhtar Afghan were part of the SC’s 13-judge full court.

SC’s senior judge Justice Mansoor Ali Shah read the 8-5 majority verdict, nullifying the PHC and ECP’s verdicts.

The court said the PTI was and remains a political party, instructing the PTI to submit a list of its candidates for reserved seats within 15 days.

The apex court on Tuesday (July 9) reserved the verdict after conducting nine hearings on the SIC’s appeals after all parties including the federal government and the ECP presented their arguments against the SIC’s plea.

Strict security arrangements were made on the routes leading to the Supreme Court. The Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) held a large protest outside the apex court before the verdict was pronounced.