ISLAMABAD: National Assembly Speaker Raja Pervez Ashraf on Tuesday sent the Supreme Court (Practice and Procedure) Bill, 2023 to NA Standing Committee on Law and Justice for further approval.
Federal Law Minister Azam Nazeer Tarar presented the bill in the National Assembly. The bill was tabled in a bid to limit the discretionary powers to take suo motu notice by Chief Justice of Pakistan.
The standing committee will meet tomorrow (Wednesday) under the chair of Chaudhry Mahmood Bashir Virk. The committee will pass the bill tomorrow after which the National Assembly will approve it.
After the clearance from all the forums, the new bill will be presented the upper house of the parliament for approval.
Earlier, the federal cabinet okayed the bill.
After approval of the bill a committee consisting of three senior judges will take the decision regarding the sou motu notice.
The bill reads: “An application pleading urgency or seeking interim relief, filed in a cause, appeal or matter, shall be fixed for hearing within fourteen days from the date of its filing.”
“Taking all decisions only by majority rule is no less dictatorship, and the absolutist approach to controversial issues is the hallmark of extremists,” the bill reads.
On Monday, two judges of Supreme Court Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah and Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail issued detailed dissenting notes in the CJP’s suo moto case of delaying elections in Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhawa. They had raised questions over the powers of the CJP.
The above mentioned SC judges said it was important to revise the power of ‘one-man show’ enjoyed by the office of the Chief Justice of Pakistan.
