The Supreme Court of Pakistan on Friday overturned the denial of reserved seats to the PTI-backed Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC), paving the way for a major legal win for Imran Khan’s party.
The verdict was announced by a 13-member bench of the top court, headed by Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa. The full bench included Justice Mansoor Ali Shah, Justice Shahid Waheed, Justice Ayesha Malik, Justice Irfan Sadaat, Justice Athar Minallah, and Justice Hasan Azhar Rizvi, and others.
“[The] withdrawal of election symbol cannot disqualify a political party from elections,” the court declared in its verdict. “The PTI was and is a political party.”
In a 4-1 verdict in March, the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) had ruled that the SIC was not entitled to claim quota for reserved seats “due to having non-curable legal defects and violation of a mandatory provision of submission of party list for reserved seats”.
The commission had also decided to distribute the seats among other parliamentary parties, with the PML-N and the PPP becoming major beneficiaries with 16 and five additional seats while the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam Fazl (JUI-F) was given four. Meanwhile, the verdict was rejected by the PTI as unconstitutional.
Later the same month, while ruling on an SIC plea, the Peshawar High Court (PHC) had dismissed an SIC plea challenging the ECP decision and denied it reserved seats.
In April, the SIC filed a petition before the SC — moved by party chief Sahibzada Hamid Raza — seeking to set aside the PHC judgment.
The apex court on May 6 had suspended the March 14 PHC judgment as well as the March 1 ECP decision to deprive the SIC of seats reserved for women and minorities.
The SC had also ordered placing the present petitions before the three-judge committee that determines the constitution of the bench for the reconstitution of a larger bench when Attorney General for Pakistan Mansoor Usman Awan highlighted that under Section 4 of the Supreme Court (Practice and Procedure) Act 2023, the present case should be heard by a larger bench since the issue concerns the interpretation of constitutional provisions.
The ECP subsequently suspended victory notifications of as many as 77 members of the national and provincial assemblies elected on those seats.
