Election challenged: LHC removes objection on petition

LAHORE:

Justice Ali Akbar Qureshi of Lahore High Court (LHC) on Wednesday overruled an objection on a petition challenging the election of a Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) MPA and ordered its office to fix it before a bench for hearing. The Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid’s (PML-Q’s) PP-113 (Gujrat-IV) candidate Ijaz Chaudhry had challenged the election of Tariq Mahmood of the PML-N from the constituency. The registrar’s office had returned the petition with an objection. On Tuesday, when it came up for hearing as an objection case, the petitioner’s counsel said the office had no authority to do this as only the court was empowered to take such a step. Justice Qureshi then overruled the objection and ordered the petition to be fixed before a bench for hearing. Chaudhry told the court that Tariq was no righteous man. He said he had concealed the fact that he was employed in Spain and not eligible to contest an election in Pakistan.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 6^th, 2016.