ISLAMABAD – The Supreme Court on Thursday questioned the independence of the judiciary if the parliamentary committee (PC) on judges’ appointment could reject the recommendations of the Judicial Commission of Pakistan (JCP). Justice Khilji Arif Hussain said this while conducting hearing on pleas against the rejection of one-year extension in the service of six additional judges of high courts by the PC.
Other members of the four-member SC bench are Justice Mahmood Akhtar Shahid Siddiqui, Justice Jawwad S Khawaja and Justice Tariq Parvez. Additional Attorney General KK Agha argued that the PC was constitutionally empowered to accept or reject the recommendations of the JCP. He said the committee was not a rubber stamp and it exercised its constitutional powers while rejecting the extension in the service of six additional judges recommended by the JCP.
He said the country should be proud of the PC and appreciate its decisions, as it had a public as well as constitutional mandate. “If the committee rejects the recommendations of the JCP, where will be the independence of the judiciary?” Justice Khilji Arif Hussain observed. He said there were objections of “bias” against the judges who were denied extension by the committee. He said only two members of the JCP knew the four judges of the Lahore High Court whose extension was denied by the PC.
