ISLAMABAD: According to Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Qazi Faez Isa, the Arshad Sharif case was not scheduled to be heard by a larger bench of five judges because no constitutional interpretation was necessary.
On August 1, the Chief Justice provided an explanation of the rationale during the meeting of the case-fixing committee established by the Supreme Court (Practice and Procedure) Act 2023.
The matter was referred back to the committee by Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah, who presided over a three-judge bench, on the grounds that it should be considered by a bench consisting of the same number of justices as the five-judge larger panel that heard it earlier. This led to the meeting.
As per the minutes of the conference, the Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) made a point that issues that do not require interpretation of constitutional provisions do not necessarily need to be heard by a five-judge panel; instead, normal benches can hear them.
Two committee members, Justices Shah and Munib Akhtar, believed that a five-judge bench had already heard the case. Thus, it is possible to reassemble a bench that is comparable.
The committee chose to reschedule the matter before a five-judge panel made up of justices Jamal Khan Mandokhail, Muhammad Ali Mazhar, Ayesha A. Malik, Athar Minallah, and Syed Hasan Azhar Rizvi because the two judges did not agree with the CJP’s reasoning.
The committee also took into consideration a letter dated July 30 from ad hoc judges Mazhar Alam Khan Miankhel and Sardar Tariq Masood, in which they asked for the scheduling of more cases for their consideration.
Only ten cases were scheduled before the two retired SC justices, who were recently appointed as ad hoc judges to handle pending matters, and they concluded their decisions in seventy minutes. The committee determined that more cases—of which the registrar has identified 1,100 older cases—should be scheduled before the ad hoc judges.
The CJP, Justice Naeem Akhtar Afghan, Justice Shahid Bilal Hassan, and ulema members Drs. Muhammad Khalid Masud and Qibla Ayaz formed the Shariat Appellate Bench as well.
