Supreme Court adjourns the case hearing for the next two weeks.
SC also seeks responses from Fawad Chaudhry and Asad Umar.
ECP alleges Khan levelled “baseless allegations” against commisison.
ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court Tuesday served notices to PTI Chairman Imran Khan and his aides — Fawad Chaudhry and Asad Umar — in contempt of the Election Commission of Pakistan’s (ECP) case.
A three-member SC bench comprising Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial, Justice Ayesha A Malik, and Justice Athar Minallah heard the case filed by the ECP to transfer all its contempt cases against PTI leaders from different high courts to a single one.
The election commission has accused the ex-premier of levelling “baseless allegations” against the ECP and its chief in his addresses on July 18, 21, 27, August 4 and 10.
Today’s hearing
During the course of proceedings, the bench remarked that the election commission requested to transfer the cases pending in different high courts to one high court.
The ECP was of the opinion that they should prepare for local and general elections or had to fight cases in different courts, it added.
The chief justice said that the ECP also presented a judicial precedent of merging cases with the order of the Supreme Court. The Election Commission is relying on Article 186A, he added.
He asked the ECP counsel whether there was a precedent of the Supreme Court to merge the cases of different high courts. At this, the lawyer said that the top court ordered the consolidation of income tax cases pending in various high courts in 1999.
Upon this, the CJP said that clubbing of cases pending in different high courts must have the same point of law. He asked who were the petitioners in contempt of election commission cases in the high courts.
The counsel replied that PTI leaders Khan, Chaudhry, and Umar had filed cases against the election commission in the different high courts.
Justice Malik said that the Supreme Court, in the PEMRA cases, had declared that the high court cases would continue and would not be clubbed.
But Justice Minallah said that the Supreme Court had clubbed all the cases of the high courts in the Hajj assistants case.
The ECP counsel said that cases of the same nature would have conflicting judgments in different high courts.
Justice Malik said that the apex court would decide when the conflicting decisions are 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 then 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 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.
Petition
The ECP, in its petition, had stated that it had issued contempt notices to PTI chief Khan as well as other party leaders, including Umar and Chaudhry in the months of August and September.
However, these notices were challenged in high courts.
The ECP noted that under Section 10 of the Election Act, 2017, it had the authority to initiate contempt proceedings being a constitutional body.
The commission further stated that Khan and Chaudhry had challenged the contempt notices before the Lahore High Court’s Rawalpindi bench, while Asad Umar had challenged it before the Sindh High Court.
Another one was challenged before the Islamabad High Court.
During a recent PTI demonstration in Islamabad, a guy is seen falling from a container in a video that has gone viral on social media. In order to support what security officials have referred to as “fake propaganda,” PTI used this clip to assert that the person had passed away. Investigations have shown that the individual in question, Tahir Abbas, 38, is still alive and making a full recovery.
Tahir Abbas, who lives in Tehsil Phalia in the Mandi Bahauddin District and is the son of Faiz Ahmed, was hurt in the fall and is now at his brother-in-law’s house in Rawalpindi after undergoing basic medical care at a hospital.
Technical investigations revealed that Tahir Abbas had turned off his phone and was using a different number, which made it difficult to track him at first. making use of his device’s IMEI.
On November 21, 2024, Tahir Abbas, a farmer and visa agent, reportedly visited Islamabad for visa-related reasons. Later, when the tragedy happened, he joined the PTI protest.
Subsequent investigations showed that Tahir Abbas works for the PTI and is connected to PP-41 PTI MPA Bisma Riaz Chaudhry. It’s interesting to note that reports revealed Abbas had previously belonged to the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) before deciding to join the PTI.
Security personnel have made it clear that any allegations about his death are completely untrue. Additionally, Abbas’s family has verified his present whereabouts and state of health. Authorities are still looking into his actions and how he was involved in the PTI demonstration.
Imran Khan cannot be kept out of Pakistani politics, according to former federal minister Fawad Chaudhry.
“Two days ago, it seemed like things were getting better, but now there are talks of banning the PTI,” Fawad Chaudhry told reporters outside the Islamabad High Court.
He continued by saying that the PTI had already been marginalized and that only the party’s founder was left.
He emphasized that conversations were necessary to defuse the political tension because Imran Khan is an unavoidable reality in Pakistani politics.
Fawad called Imran Khan a political reality that needs to be recognized and urged the PTI to give delicate issues greater consideration.
The PTI leadership was also criticized by Fawad for their strategy’s lack of sincerity. He emphasized that if the PTI had planned to start a demonstration, it ought to have done so on February 9.
He cited the inability to establish partnerships with GDA, Jamaat-e-Islami, and JUI.
She had gone to Nawabzada Nasrullah to discuss coalitions even before Benazir Bhutto’s government fell, he recalled.
The former minister went on to say that the current leadership of the PTI had an obligation to communicate with their employees and proceed. He emphasized that PTI was the only party in Pakistan that truly represented the people.
PTI killed rangers and police officers in Islamabad and brought leased criminals under a well-thought-out plot, according to Senior Provincial Minister Punjab Marriyum Aurangzeb.
She claimed that this is the second time the PTI has visited D-Chowk to undermine the system in an interview with the Lahore media.
The assassination of the security men, she claimed, was the fault of Bushra Bibi, the founder of the PTI, and Chief Minister Khyber Pakhunkhwa Ali Amin Gandapur.
Marriyum Aurangzeb claimed that during the past three days, the country has witnessed the true nature of the PTI, with its miscreants setting fire to a number of Islamabad installations before escaping in their bulletproof vehicles.