The Supreme Court on Thursday directed both respondents in the Malik Riaz contempt of court case to tell the court how would proceedings be carried out after the new contempt of court law.
A three-member bench, headed by Justice Shakir Ullah Jan, heard the proceedings of the case. Dr Abdul Basit, counsel for Malik Riaz, argued that the new law of contempt of court had not been crafted to support Malik Riaz. “The media has just wrongly interpreted the law but in reality it will not support anyone, except those who crafted it,” he said.
“Malik Riaz does not want to benefit from the new law because he opines that this law does not have any advantage,” Basit said.
He said the Act of 1976 was a permanent law that allowed the right of appeal against show cause notice and interim judgement. He added that a dictator tried to merge the Act of 1976 with the ordinances of 2003 and 2004, while ordinance of 2003 was accumulated and merged after the detail verdict of 17-member bench of the Supreme Court over the plea of the Sindh High Court Bar Association. Basit stated that it was written in para 120 of the detailed verdict of the Supreme Court that no dictator had any right to suspend the constitution.
Justice Ejaz Afzal wanted to give the reference of PCO 1999, upon which, Basit said it was a wrong reference because PCO did not exist. Basit told the Supreme Court that the opponent respondents had not responded correctly to his arguments.
Justice Jan stated that every law of contempt of court had eight-month sentence but the procedure was not uniform and asked Basit to inform court about the properties of the new law.
Basit said he did not have the draft of the new law. Upon which Justice Jan said, “If the new law is procedural then court will follow it,” adding that, “we have to decide whether we have to continue with the old law or to follow the new law”. Basit said if the court wanted procedures for that, then the Supreme Court rules of 1980 could be consulted.
Justice Jan said note of the contempt of court was sent to the chief justice by the registrar and the chief justice ordered to register it and sent the note to Bench no II under the supervision of a Supreme Court senior judge. Upon which, Basit said it was the right of the court and the registrar violated the rules of business.
Justice Jan said the matter was related to the personality of the chief justice, “that’s why the CJP sent that note to Bench no II and the judges issued the show cause notices”. Justice Jan said notice to the attorney general was issued after initial proceedings and addressing Basit, he said, “The court sought an answer from you in show cause notice and you are presenting your arguments”.
