Justice Sardar Ejaz Ishaq of the Islamabad High Court (IHC) has sought assistance from court amici and the advocate general (AG) in the contempt of court proceedings over the transfer of a case pending before him to another bench.
The judge issued a written order of the hearing of the contempt of court case against deputy registrar and others. The judge directed the deputy registrar to show at the next hearing the rules regarding the authority to withdraw contempt of court case without the consent of the judge concerned.
The written court order stated that on the court's direction, the office brought the acting chief justice's March 17 order on record and the court requested the advocate general to assist it to understand the order.
As per the first paragraph of the chief justice's order, the petitioner did not press his request for case transfer but from the second paragraph, it appeared that the petitions were consolidated and the relief of transfer was granted, the order stated.
It is obvious that the cases could not be clubbed together without being transferred first, the judge stated in his order. He further wrote in the order that perhaps he was not reading the order correctly or perhaps there was another way to read it. He directed the AG to assist the court on the next hearing.
The order stated that a CPC was filed under Section 24, and the AG after some hesitation, admitted that Section 24 did not apply. Since, high court bench was not a subordinate court of the acting chief justice's court, the registrar's office fixed this petition before the acting chief justice with objections.
However, the order of the acting chief justice to form a larger bench did not show the reasons for removing the objections. Not writing the reasons for removing the objection was against the practice and procedure of the IHC, the order said.
For transparency, the reasons for removing the objections, especially regarding the admissibility of the application, were written. The experienced judicial officers of the office act as the first filter for inadmissible applications and the judge should write the reasons for removing the objections.
According to the order, no legal precedent has been presented so far for withdrawing a pending case. It added that the advocate general mentioned a provision of the Lahore High Court Rules regarding the formation of benches but that was irrelevant.
The judge said that the lawyers should assist the court and the public should also keep an eye on this case, adding that this case was not about the leader of a political party, or any judge, rather it was about the principle applied to every case, and the power to transfer the case using administrative powers.
The court has said that court amici would be appointed on a future date to provide assistance. It said that it became more important in a contempt of court case because no one could be a better judge than the judge, whose order was violated. The next hearing of the case will be held on April 11.
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