ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court dropped on Tuesday charges of contempt against judges who repented having taken oath under the Provisional Constitution Order, but dismissed all applications seeking review of its July 31 verdict unseating a number of superior court judges.

The 14-judge Supreme Court bench reassembled in the evening after day’s proceedings and rejected, with a majority of 13 to one, all petitions seeking review of its earlier judgment. Justice Sardar Mohammad Raza Khan was the only member who recorded a note of dissent.

Detailed reasons for the judgment will be announced later. A 14-judge bench had on July 31 declared the emergency imposed by former president Pervez Musharraf on Nov 3, 2007, and actions taken under it, including the appointment of superior court judges, as unconstitutional and illegal.

On Oct 4, the Supreme Court had issued contempt of court notices to a number of judges for having taken oath under the PCO in defiance of a restraining order by a seven-judge bench on Nov 3, 2007.

‘This stage (of unseating judges who had taken oath under the PCO) had to come and it had to be stopped and it stopped,’ Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry observed.

‘Should the practice of taking oath under the PCO be allowed to continue forever,’ the CJ asked and said this path had to be plugged.

The review petitions were dismissed after Shah Khawar, officiating as attorney general, argued that the affected judges had no right to appeal for a review because they were not a party in the first round.

In its order, the Supreme Court divided contempt notices under Article 204 of the Constitution, read with sections 3 and 4 of the Contempt of Court Act 1976, into different groups.

It disposed of notices against those judges who expressed regrets and repentance by tendering unconditional apologies and affirming their remorse through withdrawal of their petitions and tendering of resignations.

Notices of contempt were also discharged against those judges who have already retired but tendered unconditional apologies.

Those who are contesting the contempt notices will be proceeded against separately, along with the cases of judges who have not filed replies or have prayed for grant of time.

Likewise judges of the Supreme Court and high courts who have tendered resignations after the July 31 judgment will also not be proceeded.

The judges who have tendered resignations but not filed replies to notices will be asked to do so within two weeks.

The order required the judges who have neither tendered resignations nor filed replies to notices to file replies within two weeks.

Advocate Ahmed Raza Kasuri, counsel for former chief justice Abdul Hameed Dogar, informed the court that his client had sought four weeks to reply to the contempt notice.

Justice Dogar received the notice late on Monday night and decided to contest the charges. The court granted him two weeks’ time to submit the reply.

The court decided to proceed against Justice (retd) Mohammad Nawaz Abbasi because he had filed the reply, but not an unconditional apology.

The court dropped a contempt notice against Justice (retd) Syed Zulfikar Ali Bokhari, the spokesman for unseated judges, after he tendered an unconditional apology and threw himself at the mercy of the court. Forty-two judges have tendered unconditional apologies.