Islamabad:
Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail, who is also a member of a committee that forms constitutional benches (CBS) from the Supreme Court, has raised questions about the absence of rules that regulate CBS practice and procedure.
During the consultation of the reserved seat case on Monday, Justice Mandokhail asked for Sic Faisal Siddiqi to read the provisions of Article 191A, which was deployed through the 26th constitutional amendment from 2024.
The lawyer read Article 191a (6), which says that regardless of something contained in the Constitution, but subject to law, the judges nominated under clause (1) can make rules for regulating practice and procedure for CBS.
This provision reflects that CB judges will hit rules for regulating benches.
However, Justice Aminuddin Khan replied that the word “May” has been used in this provision showing that rules framing are not mandatory.
Monday’s hearing in the case for reserved seats reflects that the CB Committee includes justice Aminuddin Khan, Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail and Justice Muhammad Ali Mazahar is shared on the question of framing rules for CBS.
Under the Supreme Court’s press release on November 20, 2024, the SC registrar was tasked with drafting draft rules that regulate practice and procedures for CBS in consultation with Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar, with the final draft to be reviewed by the committee for approval.
However, it is not clear whether the SC registrar shared the proposed rules with the committee for final approval. The Committee was in accordance with Article 191a (2).
The meeting attended by Justice Mandokhail, Justice Mazhar and the SC registrar, had considered several critical issues aimed at improving the effectiveness and transparency of case management, especially for CBS.
Lawyers are already raising their vote on the absence of rules for nomination of judges to CBS as well as CBS’s constitution, as mentioned in Article 191a (6) of the Constitution.
CJP Yahya Afridi, in its capacity as chairman of JCP on March 3, formed a committee to draw up an objective criterion for selecting Judges of CBS under clause (4) of Article 175-A and for the selection of judges to CBS in accordance with Article 191-A and 202-A.
Justice Mandokhail leads the committee. It is not clear whether the committee has completed its rules. It has witnessed that in the absence of rules some SC judges who are not in the good books from the executive have been excluded from CBS.
Three Senior SC referees – CJP Afridi, Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah and Justice Munib Akhtar – are excluded from CBS for no reason. Even Justice Mandokhail Monday expressed the desire for all judges to be nominated for benches.
If all judges are included in the CBS, the composition of the CB Committee will also change and the current members will become irrelevant. Now a debate has started with why some judges show reluctance to support the nomination of all SC judges for the constitutional benches.
Even no explanation has been given to exclude the six judges who were part of the original bench that heard the case from the larger petition for consultation review in the case. To ensure transparency, there is a need for the rules to be framed for the nominations as well as CBS’s constitution of CBS
Now all eyes on the 11-member are larger bench to see if it accepts or rejects objections to the bench, which does not include the judges who were part of the previous bench for no valid reason.
Some lawyers believe that the CB Committee should at least nominate these six judges in the larger bench hearing reserved seats. At least the committee should move the burden and refer the matter to JCP.
It witnessed that the bench was not properly composed in the case 63a. Now, PTI accusations are accusing that the reversal of judgment for the interpretation of Article 63a for Constitution had given the director adopted on the 26th constitutional amendment.
