PCO judges case: Court dismisses Dogar’s objections against bench

Judges on the bench are guilty of contempt of court: ex-CJP’s counsel.

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court on Wednesday dismissed former chief justice Abdul Hameed Dogar’s objections to the formation of the four-member bench hearing the PCO Judges case.

The bench headed by Justice Mahmood Akhtar Shahid Siddiqui had on Tuesday reserved its verdict on the objections raised against it by Ibrahim Satti, the counsel for Abdul Hameed Dogar.

The court has been conducting the proceedings of the cases of retired chief justice Abdul Hameed Dogar, and former chief justice of Lahore High Court, Iftikhar Hussain Chaudhry. The bench also comprised Justice Jawad S Khawaja, Justice Khilji Arif Hussain and Justice Tariq Pervez.

All four judges on the bench also committed contempt of court by resuming their duties in the judiciary before Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry’s restoration. The bench should therefore not conduct the proceedings for this case, Satti had argued.  The court was adjourned till today (Thursday).

The cases of eight sitting judges are being heard for taking oath under the provisional constitutional order issued by former president Pervez Musharraf on November 3, 2007. They are Justice of the Supreme Court, Syed Zahid Hussain, Justice Khurshid Anwar Bhinder, Justice Hamid Ali Shah, Justice Zafar Iqbal Chaudhry, Justice Hasnat Ahmad Khan, Justice Syed Shabbar Raza Rizvi, Justice Yasmin Abbasey and Justice Jehan Zaib Rahim of the high courts.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 13^th, 2011.