ISLAMABAD: The Sup­reme Court on Tuesday finally suspended the notification of Senator-elect Ishaq Dar as a member of the upper house of parliament for his failure to appear in court despite repeated summons.

A three-judge bench, hea­ded by Chief Justice of Pakistan Mian Saqib Nisar, suspended the notification as the former finance minister and Senator-elect Dar did not even adhere to the final court warning to him to appear in person even if he had to come in an ambulance.

The apex court was hearing the petition of Mohammad Nawazish Ali Pirzada who had challenged the Lahore High Court verdict of allowing Mr Dar, who had been declared absconder by an accountability court, to contest the Senate polls in March.

On April 24, the apex court had observed if the former minister had apprehensions that he would be arrested the moment he would return, he could be granted protective bail.

However, when the matter came up for hearing on Tuesday, Mr Dar was not present in the apex court.

The former minister has been in London since October 2017.

“Whenever we talk about his court appearance, he (Dar) becomes ill but looks good on television,” regretted Justice Ijaz-ul-Ahsan, a member of the bench.

Appearing in court on behalf of Mr Dar, Nasir Bhutta said a medical certificate and a report about his medical condition had been submitted in the court.

According to the medical report, Mr Dar has been suffering from left arm and chest pains resulting from a spinal issue in his neck and may require surgery if his condition does not improve within a month.

A medical report issued by the London Neurosurgery Partnership and dated April 26 stated that Mr Dar also had cardiac issues and had to undergo an emergency stent implant in the past.

The report signed by Consultant Neurosurgeon Richard Gullan stated that an MRI had shown “quite bad spondylitic change” in Dar’s neck after he started experiencing “quite unpleasant left arm and chest pain symptoms”.

In his challenge, Mr Pirzada had objected to the Senate election of the judicial absconder, stating that he was not entitled to contest the polls under Articles 62 and 63 of the Constitution. The entire system would be affected if the absconder was allowed to contest the Senate elections, the petitioner contended.

The defence counsel, Salman Butt, in his rejoinder pleaded before the court to dismiss the petition as not maintainable and in violation of the provisions of the Constitution.

The concise statement had also highlighted that the 18th Amendment had repealed the changes inserted through the Legal Framework Order (LFO) and then preserved through the 17th Constitution Amendment in Article 63(1) of the Constitution in which a person convicted for having absconded was declared disqualified to contest elections. Thus, he argued, it was clear that ever-since the enactment of the 18th Amendment, there was no legal prohibition on a person who had been declared absconder from contesting the Senate elections.

Published in Dawn, May 9th, 2018