KARACHI, Oct 10: The Sindh High Court will hear PPP chairperson Benazir Bhutto’s plea for the membership of the National Assembly on October 29.

The court issued notices to the attorney general, the Election Commission, the National Accountability Bureau and other respondents on Wednesday.

The application was filed by Advocate Farooq H. Naek as Ms Bhutto’s attorney through Advocate Adnan Karim so that the PPP chief could assume her responsibilities as an MNA soon after her return on October 18.

Chief Justice Sabihuddin Ahmed will head the bench comprising Justices Anwar Zaheer Jamali, Mushir Alam, Rahmat Husain Jaferi and Faisal Arab.

The PPP chairperson said in her application that she had moved a petition against the rejection of her nomination papers for a seat reserved for women in the National Assembly in 2002. The papers were rejected on the ground that NAB cases had been pending against her. She was sentenced to three years in one of those cases for her inability to appear under Section 31-A of the NAB Ordinance. She had challenged the rejection of papers in the SHC. The cases had since been quashed and Section 31-A was repealed by the National Reconciliation Ordinance.