LAHORE, July 20: Important PML-N leaders have advised the exiled former prime minister Mian Nawaz Sharif to move a petition in the Supreme Court to have the banishment of his family declared illegal.

However, Mr Sharif is examining the pros and cons of the advice and, encouraged by the bold judgement given by the apex court in the presidential reference against Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, will take a final decision on the subject in the near future, sources close to the PML-N leader say.

The Sharif family was banished to Saudi Arabia in December 2000 reportedly under an agreement in the presence of which they will have to stay out of the country for 10 years.

However, the Sharifs deny that they signed any such agreement.

Other party leaders argue that the Constitution doesn’t allow the government to banish anybody on any pretext.

The government says it is in possession of an agreement signed by some members of the Sharif family, but is reluctant to make it public because the Saudi government is also a party to it.

PML-N President Mian Shahbaz Sharif, living in London for the past several years, had flown into the city some two years ago, but was immediately deported to the Saudi Arabia by a special plane.

The government had taken the action despite a then Supreme Court judgment that any Pakistani was free to come to Pakistan and stay anywhere in the country. Lawyers said that in the light of the verdict the exiled Sharif family was free to return home.

No petition was moved in the apex court against the deportation.

Friday’s judgment of the Supreme Court has given a new ray of hope to the PML-N leaders and they have started thinking about moving the apex court to pave the way for the return of the Sharifs.

The PML-N, though opposed to President Musharraf’s plan to seek re-election from the present assemblies, is not very clear on whether to seek the Supreme Court’s intervention to thwart the move.

Gen Musharraf must resign after Friday’s verdict of the apex court, sources close to the Sharifs said. “If he doesn’t, we’ll continue our struggle against him more vigorously”.