Contempt of court: SC to indict Babar Awan on Thursday

Awan’s counsel maintains that court cannot indict Awan without having made decision on unconditional apology.


Web Desk May 16, 2012

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court of Pakistan will indict former law minister, Babar Awan on Thursday, after he withdrew an intracourt appeal on Wednesday, Express News reported.

Awan had filed an intracourt appeal in the court after the court did not consider his unconditional apology. He had offered the apology twice to the court.

Heading a three-member bench, Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry heard Awan’s appeal and allowed him to take his appeal back.

Awan’s counsel, Ali Zafar, maintained during the hearing that the court cannot indict Awan without having made a decision on the unconditional apology he offered twice to the court.

He said that the purpose of contempt of court proceedings is to maintain the respect of the judiciary not to “demean someone”.

The chief justice observed that different cases cited during the hearing were not relevant and that Awan’s counsel should let the court conclude its proceedings.

The former law minister was prosecuted for contempt of court adjudication after he criticised an apex court verdict handed down on December 1, 2011, pertaining to the formation of a judicial commission to probe the Memogate scandal.

In his apology letter, Awan had stated that his comments regarding the judiciary were unintentional, based on inadvertence and that he was offering an unconditional apology for his utterances that have been found prima facie to be disrespectful by this bench.

COMMENTS (7)

HoneyBee | 11 years ago | Reply

another 30 sec prison sentence . . . . ;-)

naeem khan Manhattan,KS | 11 years ago | Reply

Where would you see a person with a fake degree and flaunt it to the whole nation and then become the guardian of the law ministry, it was a travesty to appoint him as law minister, his whole life is full being turncoat and stabbing people in the back,corruption aside. It is time that the Supreme Court of Pakistan do something about these people who has no respect for the law because they think they are above the law and can get away with it.If he has done what he is accused of in the USA, even a municipal court would have sent him to jail to cool his heels. But Pakistan is a different matter because the laws are only meant for the masses. I will say to the honorable justices to throw a book at him and make him an example to the other scum bags of the law profession.

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