Led by Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Qazi Faez Isa, the bench consisting of Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah, Justice Muneeb Akhtar, Justice Yahya Afridi, Justice Amin-ud-Din Khan, Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail, Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar, Justice Athar Minallah, Justice Syed Hassan Azhar Rizvi, Justice Shahid Waheed, Justice Irfan Saadat Khan and Justice Naeem Akhtar Afghan, adjourned the hearing till 11:30am tomorrow (Tuesday).
During the Monday’s hearing, Supreme Court’s Justice Mansoor stressed that the court wants every political party to be given its due rights.
Also read: SC remarks reserved seats only be allocated based on proportional representation
The judge remarked, "The court wants to ensure that no party is given more or less seats than what is due to it.
Sikander Bashir, the electoral watchdog’s lawyer, informed the court that the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Inaf (PTI) issued party affiliation certificates along with Form 66 signed by Barrister Gohar Khan.
However, Sikandar argued, the nomination papers filed by the PTI candidates weren’t valid since it had neither held intra-party polls at that time nor had elected a party chairman.
Regarding PTI’s intra-party polls, the chief justice said that it is an accepted fact that the PTI failed to hold polls within the party despite being given a year’s time.
Meanwhile, apex court’s Justice Ayesha inquired about the ECP’s counsel regarding the KP advocate general’s argument. In his argument, the advocate general had maintained that the Balochistan Awami Party (BAP) was allocated reserved seats despite failure to submit the list of candidates.
Also read: ECP suspends ruling coalition’s lawmakers elected on SIC’s reserved seats
The judge also asked the ECP, "You didn’t take any action against the BAP. Did you hold any meeting on the said issue regarding the aforesaid party?”
The reserved seats issue is very significant for the PTI-backed independent candidates as they lost a total of 77 reserved seats in the National Assembly and provincial assemblies because of the Peshawar High Court (PHC)'s verdict.
In the February 8 elections, the PTI-backed independent candidates emerged victorious and subsequently joined the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) to claim seats reserved for minorities and women.
However, the ECP citing the PTI’s failure to submit its list of candidates denied to allocate the reserved seats of its share to the SIC.
The SIC approached the PHC but the court upheld the ECP’s decision on the issue.
Subsequently, the SIC moved the apex court seeking to set aside the PHC verdict and allocate 67 women and 11 minority seats in the assemblies to the PTI-backed party.
