A meeting of the Supreme Court’s Practice and Procedure Judges Committee ran into a hurdle on Tuesday after Justice Mansoor Ali Shah did not attend.
Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa and Justice Aminuddin Khan waited for the senior pusine judge for a siginificant time, according to media reports.
The committee had met to reconstitute a bench to hear the appeals against Article 63-A of the constitution.
CJP Isa proposed Justice Mansoor Ali Shah’s name for the bench in place of Justice Munib Akhtar, who had announced that he would not sit on the bench.
However, since Justice Mansoor did not attend the meeting, Justice Naeem Akhtar Afghan was added to the bench.
The bench will hear appeals against Article 63-A at 11:30 am.
CJP Isa added that the bench would try to convince Justice Munib to attend the proceedings on Tuesday. He added that the letter could not be added to the court’s record as per tradition.
The SC had previously scheduled the review appeals on the interpretation of Article 63-A for September 23.
The court’s May 17, 2022, decision on a presidential reference regarding Article 63-A stated that a vote cast by a defected member of parliament against party policy would not be counted and that the duration of disqualification would be determined by Parliament.
