The Islamabad High Court (IHC) and Lahore High Court (LHC) dismissed petitions against Geo News and the channel’s senior anchors on Friday.
The IHC dismissed a petition calling for a treason case against Geo News and its senior anchors and cancelation of the channel’s license. The IHC stated that the petition was non-maintainable.
The petition called for the federation, Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA), Geo management, Ansar Abbasi, Najam Sethi, Idrees Bakhtiar, Muneeb Farooq, Imtiaz Alam, Iftikhar Ahmad, Umar Cheema, Dr Aamir Liaquat Hussain, Asma Shirazi and Amir Mir to become parties in the case.
The petition filed by a local journalist maintained that Geo management, anchors, Amir Mir and private channel anchor Asma Shirazi disgraced the Army during a transmission and should be tried for high-treason. The petition also called for the cancellation of Geo’s license.
Meanwhile, the LHC also dismissed a petition against the Jang/Geo group filed by the anchor of a private news channel.
During the proceedings, Justice Ejazul Hasan remarked that the petitioner had not read Article 6 of the Constitution which states that the petition should be submitted to the federal government. The Constitution outlines procedures for a treason case, Justice Ejaz remarked. He further said that this court was not the appropriate forum for these charges.
Justice Ejaz told the petitioner that he was not an affected party as the allegations had been levelled against the ISI in the case, adding that the Defence Minister and the federal government had already taken notice. Justice Ejaz further said that a judicial commission had been formed and its report should be waited for.