ISLAMABAD: The Sup­reme Court Bar Association (SCBA) on Thursday filed a petition with the Supreme Court seeking the issuance of an order to restrain the government from carrying out its declared intention of stopping parliamentarians from taking part in the vote later this month on the no-trust motion against Prime Minister Imran Khan.

Moved under the apex court’s original jurisdiction, the petition sought an order binding National Assembly Speaker Asad Qaiser to discharge his duties in accordance with the Constitution by putting to vote the no-confidence motion against the prime minister.

Muhammad Ahsan Bhoon, the SCBA president, moved the petition through his counsel Mansoor Usman Awan. The petition was moved against the backdrop of two recent developments — a declaration by PTI that it would assemble “one million people” at Islamabd’s D-Chowk on March 27 and the opposition’s call for a long march on the capital on March 23.

“It is foreseeable that the assemblies intended to be gathered by the respondents will result in violence, which is in violation of the citizens’ rights protected under the Constitution, as has been conclusively held by the Supreme Court in the 2017 Faizabad Dharna (sit-in) case,” the petitioner stated.

Mr Bhoon said he had filed the petition because he feared that loss of life, liberty and property was inevitable if the respondents were allowed to proceed with their unconstitutional and illegal intentions.

The matter is thus ripe for the apex court to invoke its constitutional jurisdiction under Article 184(3) of the Constitution and restrain the respondents from carrying out their “illegal and unconstitutional intentions”, the petitioner said.

The petition named the federal government, through the interior and defence secretaries, the prime minister, Leader of the Opposition Shehbaz Sharif, the National Assembly Speaker, Islamabad’s chief commissioner, deputy commissioner and the police chief, as respondent.

The petition also sought a directive for all state functionaries to act in accordance with the Constitution and also an order restraining them from acting in any manner unwarranted by the Constitution.

The petition pleaded that the respondents and officials acting on their instructions be ordered not to prevent any MNA from attending the session of the National Assembly. The respondents must be restrained from arresting or detaining MNAs, the petitioner pleaded with the court.

The SCBA had rushed a similar petition on Aug 13, 2014, seeking a restraining order against state functionaries from taking any extra-constitutional step on the eve of the four-month sit-in by the PTI against the government of prime minister Nawaz Sharif.

Chief Justice of Pakistan Nasir-ul-Mulk had restrained the authorities from acting in violation of the Constitution and the law.

Published in Dawn, March 18th, 2022