Judge suspended after he moves SJC against CJP Nisar

PESHAWAR: Peshawar High Court (PHC) on late Wednesday suspended the district and sessions judge from Kohat and made him an officer on special duty (OSD) day after he filed a reference against Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Mian Saqib Nisar in Supreme Judicial Council (SJC).

Ahmed Sultan Tareen was transferred from being district and sessions judge in Kohat to an OSD in Peshawar and suspended with immediate effect in ‘public interest’, a notification issued by the PHC said.

The notification further ordered replacement of Tareen with District and Sessions Judge at Customs, Taxation and Anti-Smuggling Court in Peshawar, Shoaib Khan.

Also, the PHC suspended district and sessions judge Azeem Khan Afridi. Four additional district and sessions judges and two senior civil judges were replaced as part of the decision.

On Tuesday, the former sessions judge Tareen had filed a complaint of misconduct against the CJP. As per reports, Tareen sent the 15-page complaint by courier against the top judge in the SJC.

Tareen, in his complaint, had argued that CJP’s current conduct has exposed him as lacking most of the qualities of judge mentioned in Article-II of the Code of Conduct issued by SJC in 2009.

The complaint also mentioned Article-V of the Code of Conduct, which requires of a judge that he should not indulge himself in any public controversy, least of all a political issue.

The complaint read that there is a lot of evidence against Justice Saqib Nisar that has failed to follow the Code of Conduct as required to be observed within limitations of Article-V.

“The chief justice, in a worldly sense, is the last hope of citizens of Pakistan for the sake of justice. The CJP heading this forum of hope is not supposed to be irresponsible in his spoken conduct,” the complaint said.