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PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court on Thursday fined a petitioner Rs10,000 over repeated non-appearance of his lawyer in a case seeking the disqualification of Prime Minister Imran Khan from holding any public office on multiple grounds.
A bench consisting of Justice Lal Jan Khattak and Justice Syed M Attique Shah took exception to the failure of the counsel for Inamullah Khan of Justice and Democratic Party led by former Supreme Court chief justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, to show up and ordered the petitioner to deposit Rs10,000 in the bank account of the Fatmid Foundation as fine.
It fixed Mar 18 for the next hearing into the petition asking the counsel to argue the case on that date and declared that if he didn’t appear, the matter would be decided in his absence.
The petitioner had lost the 2018 election to Imran Khan in the NA-35 Bannu constituency.
PHC warns matter will be decided in counsel’s absence
He mainly relied in his petition on the grounds that during the 2018 general elections, Mr Imran neither mentioned the name of his alleged daughter in his nomination papers nor did he disclose the assets of his current wife.
Senior lawyer Mohammad Habib Qureshi appeared on the behalf of the prime minister and contended that the petition was filed with mala fide and ulterior motives.
He insisted that the petition was not maintainable as the Supreme Court had already decided the matter in favour of his client and that fresh hearing into it would be contempt of the apex court.
The lawyer contended that the matter was past and closed transaction. He said after winning the polls, Mr Imran had vacated that seat and by-elections had already been conducted on it.
Mr Qureshi also referred to different judgments of the superior courts and election laws and said the petitioner had concealed important facts from the court.
He said during the last many hearings, the petitioner’s counsel had not appeared before the court delaying the case on one pretext or another knowing its fate, so the petition should be dismissed.
After examining the case records, the bench expressed annoyance over the absence of the petitioner’s counsel and imposed a penalty of Rs10,000 on the petitioner.
The petitioner has claimed that while contesting the NA-35 election, Mr Imran had filed a false declaration and affidavit with his nomination papers and didn’t mention the name of his ‘daughter’.
He claimed that the respondent was not ‘righteous’ and ‘sagacious’ in terms of articles 62 and 63 of the Constitution.
The petitioner said he had raised important objections before the returning officer of the said constituency but they’re rejected leading to the acceptance of Mr Imran’s nomination papers.
In 2019, an application was filed on behalf of the prime minister declaring that the petitioner had concealed the Supreme Court’s declaration that Mr Imran was ‘sadiq and amen’ under articles 62 and 63 of the Constitution.
The applicant contended that the petition was an election matter against the decision of the returning officer at a pre-election stage and the electoral laws provided remedies against pre-election grievances under sections 8 and 9 of the Elections Act, 2017, which had not been availed by the petitioner, and therefore, the petition was liable to be dismissed.