- ‘It is beyond imagination to even think of having a disrespectful behaviour against judges, judicial system’
Justice Ejaz Afzal Khan-led three member Supreme Court bench while hearing contempt case against Mir Shakil-ur-Rehman of the Jang Group took him to task over publication of multiple news stories pertaining to the Joint Investigation Team (JIT) and the Panama Papers case here on Tuesday.
In its response to the Supreme Court, the Jang Group said that it was beyond imagination for the group to even think of having a disrespectful behaviour against the judges and the judicial system, mentioning that the steps and errors written in the contempt of court notice were not against the judges and the court.
Jang Group’s Editor-in-Chief Mir Shakil-ur-Rehman, printer and publisher Mir Javed-ur-Rehman and reporter Ahmad Noorani submitted their response to the Supreme Court in relation to the contempt of court case. The group pleaded the court to take back the notice, saying that the media house upholds the judiciary’s freedom, respect, struggle to establish the writ of law and its legacy.
Addressing the bench, Mir Shakil said that he has utmost respect for the law and the court and informed the court that his media house received the most advertisements from the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government. Justice Ijazul Ahsan remarked that the issue was the reporting that was wrong and stories from the sources were published without checking their veracity.
“The intent was to discredit JIT and courts,” Justice Ijazul Ahsan remarked. Justice Sheikh Azmat Saeed asked that whose fundamental rights were being infringed here. It is pertinent to mention here that the day when JIT submitted its report to the Supreme Court on July 10 during the very hearing the bench sought clarification from the group that why contempt proceedings under the Article 204 of the Contempt Ordinance should not be instituted against them.
In their replies submitted to the court, both Mir Shakil and Mir Javed said that their channel was not the only one to broadcast the content, many others do it as well and requested that their group may not be singled out. Back in 2003, in order to regulate the exercise of the powers of the courts to punish for contempt of court, an ordinance titled, ‘The Contempt of Court Ordinance, 2003’ was promulgated.
In Section 3 of the ordinance, the definition of the contempt of court was given as — ‘Whoever disobeys or disregards any order, direction or process of a court, which he is legally bound to obey; or commits a willful breach of a valid undertaking given to a court; or does anything which is intended to or tends to bring the authority of a court or the administration of law into disrespect or disrepute, or to interfere with or obstruct or interrupt or prejudice the process of law or the due course of any judicial proceedings, or to lower the authority of a court or scandalise a judge in relation to his office, or to disturb the order or decorum of a court is said to commit contempt of court, the contempt is of three types, namely; the civil contempt, criminal contempt and judicial contempt.
“Normally the courts show a lot more restraint in contempt cases. As the conventions tell us that the people go in there when summoned and tender their unconditional apologies and court accepts them,” said Advocate Badar Iqbal Chaudhry. He was of the view that since the courts know that they have to balance out justice, thus in light of their apology the court gives them reprieve.
“However, there is an exception as well. It is of Advocate Babar Awan, whose membership of the Supreme Court was suspended for two years in 2012 by then Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, although he tendered his apology still he only managed to get his license back in 2014,” he said. The hearing was adjourned till August 22.
Mir Shakil is once again in the eye of a storm for a reply he gave to a query outside the Supreme Court here. While most of his media talk revolved around clearing his group’s stance, a reply to a loaded question about a comment made by Justice Azmat Saeed – where he hinted at the idea that he (Mir) has a role to play in rise and fall of stock prices – not only agitated the media mogul but he also replied aggressively.
“If a judge said that I am involved in the ups and downs in the stock market, it is disgusting and I will take such judge to the court,” he replied. It was this reply to the query that grabbed the headlines and made it to the prime time tally, while dwarfing everything else Mir Shakil said to the media.
Speaking to media after the hearing, Mir Shakil said that media gives too much importance to the remarks of the judges which is wrong. “Those remarks that don’t make it to the orders and judgments of the court have no worth,” he said, adding that the media should admit that it committed mistakes.
“Our group also made mistakes. If our stories turn out to be false, we’ll apologise from the court,” he said. “Imran Khan has only levelled baseless allegations and so far has given no proof,” he said, regretting that a committee has been formed on the matter, but he (Imran) did never show up. He also said that their legal team told them that all stories were correct except one.
