The Supreme Court (SC) on Tuesday declared Islamabad High Court’s (IHC) Sept 16 decision to bar Justice Tariq Mehmood Jahangiri from judicial work “null and void”, a day after the apex court ordered the decision’s suspension.Yesterday, the court adjourned the hearing to 30 September  and issued notices to all the respondents, as well as the Attorney General of Pakistan (AGP) Mansoor Usman Awan, to appear before the court.

On September 16, the IHC had restrained Justice Jahangiri from exercising his judicial powers as a two-judge bench issued the interim order while hearing a writ petition filed under Article 199 of the Constitution. Justice Jahangiri then challenged the decision in the SC, pleading for the restraining order to be set aside.The matter centres on a letter that began circulating last year on social media, purportedly from the University of Karachi’s controller of examinations, regarding the judge’s law degree.

Resuming the hearing on  Tuesday, the five-member Constitutional Bench headed by Justice Aminuddin Khan and comprising Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail, Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar, Justice Hassan Azhar Rizvi and Justice Shahid Bilal Hassan — took up Justice Jahangiri’s petition. AGP Awan appeared before the court and said, “A judge cannot be barred from judicial work through an interim order.“ At this, Justice Aminuddin asked respondent Mian Daud, who had filed the original petition against Justice Jahangiri, for his opinion.

In response, Daud said: “I hold the same opinion — a judge cannot be stopped from judicial work.” He added that “an order barring a judge from their duties can not be defended.” Noting the AGP’s statement and that of other relevant parties, Justice Aminuddin set aside the IHC order, ruling that a judge can not be stopped from carrying out judicial duties. The CB, while referring to the SC registrar’s office objections regarding the petition against Justice Jahangiri in the IHC, directed the court to “first decide on the objections in the writ petition.”

 During the hearing, the matter of the maintainability of the writ petition came under discussion as Justice Jahangiri’s legal counsel, Munir Malik, addressed the court and said, “according to yesterday’s court order, it was written that the writ is maintainable, but in my opinion, only the SJC can take action against a judge.” At yesterday’s hearing, the CB had made it clear that it would only examine the Sept 16 restraining order and not the main petition questioning Justice Jahangiri’s degree

.“No one should be under the impression that we have accepted the high court’s jurisdiction to hear the writ petition,” he added, referring to the Malik Asad Ali case. To this, Justice Aminuddin responded: “We have written in the order only the language that is present in the Malik Asad Ali case.”In his remarks, Justice Mandokhel said, “We have only maintained that a judge may only be removed by the SJC.” Justice Mazhar asserted that, “We are not touching on the question of the maintainability of the writ of quo warranto.

Whether it merited a hearing in a high court is up to the relevant high court to decide.“The only question before us is whether a judge can be prevented from working through an interim order,” he said, stressing that the CB at the moment “will not address the question of whether a writ petition can be filed against a judge.”“Both the Supreme Court and High Court judges are not office holders, Justice Mandokhel observed, but then went on to say that “all of these things can be discussed when the case is heard on merit.”

“We do not want to go on merit in the present case,” he said. On Monday, the SC suspended the order issued by the IHC barring Justice Jahangiri from carrying out judicial duties in a case pertaining to his law degree allegedly being fake. Meanwhile, the Sindh High Court (SHC) is set to hear a petition filed by Justice Jahangiri today, challenging the cancellation of his law degree. 

Justice Jahangiri has impugned the decisions of University of Karachi’s Unfair Means Committee (UMC) and Syndicate, which cancelled his degree in August last year. The IHC judge recently approached the SHC, but at the time of filing, the court’s additional registrar (writ) raised several objections, including questions about the maintainability of the petition and the delay in filing it.

Credit: Independent News Pakistan (INP)