ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court (SC) on Wednesday rejected a set of pleas moved by former chief commissioner Khalid Pervaiz and Deputy Commissioner (DC) Chaudhry Mohammad Ali, allegedly involved in roughing up former chief justice of Pakistan (CJP) Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry on March 13, 2007.

Headed by Supreme Court Chief Justice Gulzar Ahmed, a five-judge bench had taken up the petitions seeking review of the June 6, 2018 decision in which the apex court had ordered sending all the police officials to jail under contempt of court charges for being involved in the alleged manhandling of the former chief justice.

Khalid Pervaiz and DC Chaudhry Mohammad Ali, however, were not arrested since they were earlier sentenced to imprisonment till the rising of the court.

During the hearing, Senior Counsel Umar Aslam and Raja Muqsid, who defended Mohammad Ali and Khalid Pervaiz respectively, tried to cite news reports as well as the statement of former prime minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali in which the late premier had stated that the behaviour of both the officers were bonafide and they in fact tried to save the former CJP when he tried to walk from his residence to the Supreme Court where he was called by the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) to face a reference on misconduct.

The counsel tried to establish that given the security situation prevalent at that particular time in view of the Lal Masjid episode, it was necessary to take measures and stop Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry from reaching the apex court on foot.

At this the chief justice observed that if this plea was accepted, the administration would never allow the judges of the superior courts to come out of their residence ever.

“Why the former chief justice of Pakistan was stopped from walking; even if he had taken the risk of his life, why was he stopped,” Justice Gulzar Ahmed said.

The bench also observed that the applications and newspaper cutting being cited by the counsel were never relied at the time when their intra-court appeals were being heard by the apex court.

Referring to the statement of the former prime minister, the Supreme Court observed that this statement was not relevant to the present case, adding that the manhandling of a judge could not be considered a measure of good faith.

Earlier, the Supreme Court had sentenced former inspector general of police Chaudhry Iftikhar Ahmed and SSP retired Capt Zafar Iqbal to 15 days in jail and DSP Jamil Hashmi, inspector of police Rukhsar Mehdi and Assistant Sub-Inspector Mohammad Siraj to one-month imprisonment.

Published in Dawn, January 13th, 2022