PHC rejects petitions of SIC regarding reserved seats

Peshawar: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) Thursday rejected the petitions related to the reserved seats of the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC).

According to the details, a five-member larger bench headed by Justice Ishtiaq Ibrahim of the PHC heard the petitions related to the reserved seats of the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC), in which the lawyer of the SIC, Barrister Ali Zafar, gave arguments in the court while he also apologized for not appearing in the court yesterday.

During the hearing, Ali Zafar gave arguments that before the election, the electoral symbol ‘bat’ of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) was taken away. PHC gave a historic decision and returned the call, the Supreme Court again gave a decision in favor of the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) and withdrew the call. SIC is a registered party and also has an election symbol, not participating in the election is not a big deal, sometimes political parties can boycott the elections.

Justice Shakeel asked what will happen if one does not participate in the elections. Ali Zafar replied that he is talking about the fact that if he is a political party, so what are his basic constitutional rights?

“Under Article 17, I have many basic rights, a party is a political party even if it does not contest elections, it is not necessary that a party contests election or not, all our rights are there in Sub-Article-II of Article 17, which says that every citizen has the right to be part of a party or create his own party,” added Barrister Zafar.

SIC lawyer stated that the SIC was kept away from reserved seats. The ECP is confused in distinguishing between parliamentary party and political party, but there is a definition of parliamentary and political party in Pervez Elahi case.

Justice SM Atiq asked that if independent candidates get together in the assembly, will they get reserved seats or independent candidates have to join the party.

Ali Zafar replied on court inquiry that independent candidates will get seats if they join any party.

The court stated that the reserved seats are given when the political parties have won the seat, since SIC has not won any seat, even independent candidates cannot join it if it has not won the seat. The seat was not won, the head of the SIC himself did not participate in the elections with this party.

After the arguments of SIC lawyer Ali Zafar were completed, ECP lawyer Sikander Bashir Mohmand came to the rostrum and argued that the Balochistan Awami Party (BAP) has nothing to do with this matter, this is a declaration and not a decision, these petitions are reserved for all assemblies. As for the seats, these petitions are beyond the jurisdiction of this Court, the petitions filed in the Sindh High Court (SIC) are similar to these petitions.

He added that zero plus zero is zero and zero plus one is one.

Later, the Election Commission's lawyer completed his arguments, on which the court reserved its decision, which will be pronounced after some time.

The court stated that the applications are unanimously rejected.