ISLAMABAD: Justice Babar Sattar of the Islamabad High Court (IHC) has questioned the chief justice’s authority to administratively reassign cases, emphasising that such decisions fall within the jurisdiction of judges and the deputy registrar.

Justice Sattar issued the remarks in an order addressing the reassignment of a writ petition — No. 937/2025 (Muhammad Nadeem vs Federation of Pakistan) — which challenges the acting chief justice’s intervention in retaining the case before a bench that had previously recused itself.

The case was initially transferred to another bench on March 14, after the original bench deem­­­ed reassignment appropriate.

However, following remarks from the acting chief justice’s office, the file was returned to the same bench, prompting Justice Sattar to rule the intervention as “not in accordance with the High Court Rules”.

Says reassignment requests must be routed through deputy registrar

In a detailed order, Justice Sattar cited Rule 4 of Part A, Chapter 3 of Volume V of the Lahore High Court Rules (adopted by the IHC), which mandates that once a case is assigned to a bench, only that bench or the deputy registrar — guided by the approved roster — can decide transfers or recusals.

The chief justice’s role, the order clarified, is limited to approving the roster of benches prepared by the deputy registrar, not intervening in individual case assignments.

“The Chief Justice has no authority to determine on the administrative side whether a court ought to hear a case,” Justice Sattar stated, calling the return of the case an “inadvertent mistake”.

He further stressed that reassignment requests must be routed through the deputy registrar (judicial) to ensure compliance with institutional protocols.

Justice Sattar directed that the file be sent to the deputy registrar for reassignment to an available bench.

“Once a judge determines recusal, the judicial order is not amenable to interference by the Chief Justice’s office; the matter must be marked to the Deputy Registrar,” he observed.

Published in Dawn, March 29th, 2025