LAHORE: The Lahore High Court on Wednesday dismissed a petition seeking contempt proceedings against former interior minister Ahsan Iqbal for giving a statement against former chief justice Mian Saqib Nisar and his fund-raising campaign for construction of dams.

As the petition was called for hearing, Justice Syed Mazahar Ali Akbar Naqvi asked the petitioner’s counsel: “What has Ahsan Iqbal done now?”

The counsel, Azhar Siddique, stated that the decision on construction of dams was taken by a five-judge bench of the Supreme Court.

He said Mr Iqbal uttered ‘objectionable’ remarks against former chief justice Nisar and the money spent on the awareness campaign he led for the dams.

The lawyer urged the court to initiate contempt proceedings against the former interior minister.

However, Justice Naqvi did not buy this argument and observed that Ahsan Iqbal was a worker of a political party and what will he do if he did not do politics.

The judge asked the lawyer about the progress in construction of the dams.

“Are they completed?” added the judge.

“There were news that the gentleman had gone abroad for fund raising and three MNAs of PTI were also with him,” Justice Naqvi said without naming former chief justice Nisar. The judge told the lawyer that people would definitely discus such a situation.

Referring to information being circulated on social media about fund-raising visits of the former chief justice, Justice Naqvi further observed that it was heard that someone put a shoe in front of him during a fundraiser. With these observations, the judge dismissed the petition for being uncalled for.

The same lawyer had also filed a petition against Mr Iqbal in the past on his remarks against then chief justice Nisar. The court had discharged contempt proceedings against the PML-N leader after he had tendered an unconditional apology.

Published in Dawn, March 21st, 2019