ISLAMABAD, Jan 9: The Supreme Court on Wednesday admitted for hearing a review petition moved by the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) against its direction to conduct a fresh delimitation of constituencies in Karachi.

Headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, a five-judge bench ordered the registrar office to fix the MQM’s review petition case which was earlier returned by the court office by raising some objections.

In the wake of non-implementation of a direction by the apex court on worsening law and order situation in Karachi, a Supreme Court bench had conducted a series of hearings in the city and on Nov 28 the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) was asked to initiate the process of delimitation in Karachi.

MQM, the only political party opposing the delimitation, had filed the review petition in December against the observation, pleading that the court’s ruling was in violation of the Constitution.

On Wednesday, the court admitted the plea for hearing after Senator Forogh Naseem, representing the MQM, appeared before the court.

In its review petition, the MQM had pleaded that the delimitation could only be undertaken after a fresh census and pointed out that the Supreme Court should not have interfered with the ECP’s discretion by rejecting the Oct 24 statement of the commission that there could be no delimitation in Karachi without a fresh census.