ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court on Wednesday expressed the hope that the federal government would fulfil its commitment to commencing the much-needed population census on March 15, but at the same time warned that any violation of the assurance would be deemed as contempt of court.

“In view of [its] categorical statement, we believe that the government will fulfil its commitment,” a two-judge Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice Anwar Zaheer Jamali observed.

The court had taken suo motu notice of delays in the holding of a population census across the country, but disposed of the case after the government assured it that the exercise would be commenced on the date suggested by it.

The last time a census was carried out was in 1998 and the exercise has been pending since 2008 when it became due.

On Wednesday, the additional secretary in charge of the statistics division, Tariq Pasha, submitted a statement to the court through Additional Attorney General Muhammad Waqar Rana, which assured the court that the sixth population census would be held from March 15 and that the exercise would be completed in two months. The statement was submitted to the court after its approval by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.

At the last hearing on Dec 1, the court had ordered the government to submit an assurance in writing that it would commence the exercise on March 15, though the outcomes could be announced at some convenient date after proper tabulation of the data.

If the government failed to do so, the court would be left with no other choice than to summon the prime minister to explain the reasons, the order had said.

In an earlier report, the government had informed the court that it had curtailed the number of armed forces personnel required to provide security to the civilian enumerators during the exercise from 288,000 to 48,000.

The Council of Common Interests had held that up to 288,000 armed forces personnel would be required for deployment during the door-to-door exercise. Deployment of such a large number of troops for a census was not possible at the time.

But the court had observed that a delay in holding of census for want of armed forces personnel would set a wrong precedence, adding that this could allow the Election Commission of Pakistan to advance the same reason for putting off a general election.

Published in Dawn, December 8th, 2016