Islamabad:
A Constitutional Bank of five members (CB) of the Supreme Court on Friday raised several consultations on a new oath by the judges of the Superior Court in its transfer to another Superior Court and the State of its Antiquity in case of its new positions.
The judge of the head of CB, Muhammad Ali Mazhar, told the lawyer for petitioners in the case of transfer of judges that there were contradictions in his arguments. He raised the question of how a judge could provide multiple oaths.
When the hearing of the case began, the lawyer of the petitioner Faisal Siddiqui cited the example of India, where the judges were not asked for their consent for their transfer. Therefore, he added that when the judge was transferred there, his age was not affected.
In Pakistan, he said that the appointment of the judges was mandatory for the Judicial Commission, but it was not mandatory for the President to transfer the judges. Judge Mazhar commented that the president had the constitutional authority to transfer judges.
Sitting at the bank, Judge Salahuddin Panhwar reminded Siddiqui who had said that he would focus on the issue of antiquity on his arguments. The lawyer replied that the transfer of judges was linked to time and cited the appointment of judges of the Court Superior to the Federal Court of Shariat (FSC) for three years.
Judge Mazhar asked the lawyer what was the connection between the appointment of judges with the FSC and the issue of transfer.
He said that the state of a FSC judge was greater, while the state of a judge transferred from one superior court to another superior court remained the same.
Siddiqui said Judge Asif was an additional judge, so how an additional judge could be appointed as an IHC judge after the transfer.
At one point, Judge Naeem Akhtar Afghan said that the authority of the Judicial Commission could not be ineffective by appointing permanent judges through the transfer.
Judge Mazhar asked the lawyer what would happen if the transferred judges were transferred to their original Superior Court, what would be their age. The lawyer replied that when a judge was sent to the Supreme Court as an interim judge, his age in the Superior Court was not affected.
During the hearing, Judge Mazhar commented that the basic question in the matter was whether the transferred judge would take a new oath, but there were contradictions in the arguments sent by the petitioner’s lawyers.
On the one hand, Judge Mazhar told Siddiqui, argued that the transferred judge would have to provide a new oath while, on the other, it was claimed that the transfer could not be permanent. How a judge could take two or three oaths at the same time, he asked.
Judge Mazhar observed that when a judge made a new oath, the old oath would be annulled. He also said that in the Supreme Court there was a difference between an interim judge and an transferred judge. Later, the audience was postponed until Monday.
