ISLAMABAD: Former chairman Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Imran Khan, on Monday, filed an application before the Supreme Court for an early hearing of his appeal against the objections of the Registrar’s Office on his earlier petition against the Official Secrets (Amendment) Act, 2023.
The former PTI chairman requested the court to fix his plea for hearing in the next week.
The former PTI chairman filed the constitutional petition before this court against the promulgation of the impugned Official Secrets (Amendment) Act, 2023 and Pakistan Army (Amendment) Act, 2023 on the touchstone of Article 75 of the Constitution because the amendment Act has been promulgated without the assent of the President and thus cannot be notified as law.
He submitted that the constitutional petition was objected to by the Registrar of the Supreme Court, vide order dated 15-09-2023 against which the petitioner (Imran) filed a civil miscellaneous application (CMA 120/23) which is pending and has not been fixed so far.
The referred matter is of utmost importance and needs to be decided as early as possible because of its sensitivity and the public importance involving fundamental rights. Hence, the instant application is being filed for early fixation of the CMA, preferably next week.
A three-member bench, headed by Justice Tariq Masood, and comprising Justice Yahya Afridi, and Justice Ayesha A Malik on November 22 issued notices to the federal government and the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) on former prime minister Imran Khan’s appeal in the missing cypher case.
The former PM has challenged the order of the Islamabad High Court (IHC) where his post-arrest bail was declined. A single bench of IHC comprising Chief Justice Aamer Farooq on October 27 rejected Imran’s both petitions seeking post-arrest bail and the quashment of the case. The IHC chief justice noted in his written order that the petition for quashing of FIR as well as bail application are without merit and are accordingly dismissed.
Imran’s counsel, Barrister Salman Safdar, requested the bench to give a fixed date as the case was adjourned for an indefinite period. However, the bench declined his request to give a fixed date for hearing the case next, telling him; “Don’t make it a special case, and let it be a simple case.”
Copyright Business Recorder, 2023
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