SC set to announce contempt case verdict tomorrow

ISLAMABAD: The reserved verdict in the additional registrar ‘contempt of court’ case will be delivered by the Supreme Court bench tomorrow (Monday).

The case was originally set to be on the power of benches, but turned into contempt of court due to failure of being fixed for hearing. A two-member bench of the Supreme Court comprising Justice Mansoor Ali Shah and Justice Aqeel Abbasi had reserved the verdict on Thursday.

Also read: Committee, contempt, and constitutional bench: verdict reserved

The court also sought arguments on the formation of a full court in the case of powers of benches.

It may be recalled that a few days ago, the Supreme Court had removed Additional Registrar Judicial Nazar Abbas from his post over the charges of contempt of court.

In the Supreme Court’s announcement, the Registrar Supreme Court was directed to look into the matter of Additional Registrar Judicial.

According to the announcement, the additional registrar had ‘mistakenly’ scheduled the case of the Constitutional Bench for hearing before the Regular Bench, which resulted in a waste of time and resources of the Supreme Court and the parties.

Khawaja Haris, Hamid Khan, Ahsan Bhoon, and Attorney General Mansoor Usman Awan had appeared before the apex court bench to advise the court on the jurisdiction of the committees formed under Practice and Procedure Act.

The Attorney General and the judicial advisor Ahsan Bhoon had informed the court that the committee’s decision to transfer the case to the constitutional bench was correct. In Thursday’s hearing, after the completion of the arguments of the judicial advisors, Justice Mansoor said, “We want the matter to move towards a solution. A solution should be found once and for all. We have the authority; we could have issued a contempt of court notice to the committee. But we want the matter to be sent to the full court.”

Also read: Power of benches, contempt of court and dismissed officer: SC saga continues

The two-member bench comprising Justice Mansoor and Justice Abbasi had then reserved the verdict.