Barrister Aitzaz Ahsen, who is advocating Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani in the contempt of court case, claimed on Tuesday that the Supreme Court could not punish his client for more than six months.
Talking to reporters after the hearing of the case, he said the SC, in its orders on January 10, 2012, considered disqualification for life and a five-year imprisonment for his client. However, he said that he personally did not accept it. He said he believed that the court would review its consideration to this effect.
Aitzaz gave the example of Indian minister A Raja, who is currently serving jail after having been convicted of corruption, saying his corruption was in the notice of a close staff member of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. He said when the matter was agitated before the Indian Supreme Court, it held that the prime minister had so many engagements that even if his closest officer knew about the corruption, it could not be proved in the court that the prime minister also knew about it.
He said that four documents had been submitted to the court in the contempt case as evidences which imply that the prime minister did not have any knowledge of the court orders.
He said he had requested the court to pass a verdict based only on the submitted documents. He said these were complete documents, and the court could hang his client over it if it wished to do so. He said that after the introduction of Article 10-A through the 18th Amendment, the law had witnessed important and basic changes and now fair trial had become a fundamental right of every citizen. He said he had raised objections about the bench on concrete basis and the court would have to consider his objections.