Intra-court appeal in IHC: petitioners' counsel urged to remove registrar office's objection

A division bench of Islamabad High Court Tuesday directed the petitioners' counsel to remove objections of registrar's office over an intra-court appeal (ICA) filed against a single bench's verdict regarding appointment of Tariq Bajwa as governor State Bank of Pakistan (SBP).
A single judge bench had turned down a petition of 23 members of the Upper House challenging the appointment of Tariq Bajwa as the SBP governor. The dual bench comprising Justice Aamer Farooq and Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani heard the ICA as an objection matter and gave seven days to remove the office objections. Later, the court deferred the hearing for two weeks.
The senators moved the ICA through their counsel Sardar Latif Khosa and made the government of Pakistan through secretary finance and Governor SBP Tariq Bajwa as respondents. They adopted in the ICA that the impugned judgement of the IHC single bench is not sustainable in law. They added that the single bench's judge has erred in law while holding that it cannot be held that the powers to appoint and remove the SBP governor having been conferred on the President are also to be exercised by the federal government.
"Holding otherwise would render the amendment brought about in the section 10(3) of the SBP Act, through the State Bank of Pakistan (Amendment) Ordinance 2002, an exercise in futility," said the ICA.
Therefore, the petitioners prayed to the court that the impugned order of IHC single bench dated July 17 may be set aside and their writ petition praying to declare Tariq Bajwa's appointment as SBP governor illegal, unconstitutional and against the law be allowed.
Earlier, a single bench of the IHC comprising Justice Miangul Hassan Aurangzeb had dismissed the plea in his 24-pages order. Justice Miangul Hassan noted in his verdict, "There is nothing preventing the President to have made the appointment of a SBP governor after the competitive process.
However, since the statute in question does not oblige the President to make the said appointment through a competitive process or to advertise the said post, appointment of respondent No. 2 (governor SBP) cannot be held to be unlawful."
The IHC verdict added that indeed, the desirability of the petitioners or even of this court to make appointments to high offices such as the SBP governor through a competitive process is not enough to strike down respondent no. 2's appointment for there has been no violation of the SBP Act in making the said appointment.
Justice Miangul wrote, "I hold that respondent no. 2's appointment as the SBP governor cannot be held to have been made without the authority of law or in other words contrary to the relevant statutory provisions. Therefore, the essential prerequisite for the issuance of a writ of quo warranto is not satisfied. Consequently, this petition is dismissed with no order as to costs."
In their main petition, the senators had stated that they are aggrieved with the "unlawful" appointment of SBP governor made on July 7, 2017 for a period of three years. They adopted that in terms of the section 3(2) of SBP ACT, 1956, the bank is a body corporate "by the name of State Bank of Pakistan, having perpetual succession and a common seal, and shall by the said sue and sued."