ISLAMABAD, April 15: The Supreme Court on Tuesday decided to constitute a larger bench to hear a petition challenging the condition of graduation for legislators imposed by President Pervez Musharraf as the chief executive before the 2002 elections.

A three-member bench of the apex court comprising Chief Justice Abdul Hameed Dogar, Justice Chaudhry Ejaz Yousaf and Justice Mohammad Farrukh Mahmud served notices on Attorney General Malik Mohammad Qayyum and the federal government through the law ministry on the joint petition moved by citizens Mohammad Nasir Mehmood and Shameer Ahmed. The regular hearing will start from April 18.

The graduation condition has barred a number of people from contesting elections since 2002.

Accepting the notice, the attorney general described the graduation condition as a bad and discriminatory law which led to ‘an elite democracy’ by depriving 99 per cent people of their right to contest elections.

Moved under the original jurisdiction of the Supreme Court on fundamental rights, the petitioners sought a declaration that Section 99 (1) (CC) of the Representation of Peoples Act 1976 and Article 8(A) of the Chief Executive Order No 17 of 2002 were against the Constitution.

Through Article 8(A), the Section 99 (1)(CC) was inserted into the Representatives of Peoples Act, requiring a contesting candidate to be at least a graduate, in any discipline or any degree recognised by the Higher Education Commission.

These provisions, according to the petitioners, were enforced with mala fide intention to restrict a large number of people with rich experience to run the affairs of the state.

“Only 200,000 people have done their graduation and, therefore, the condition of graduation is not highly oppressive but also amounts to denying majority of the citizens to participate in the elections,” they argued.

The Supreme Court had in 2002 dismissed a similar petition filed by the PML-Q.

Now the petitioners have raised the issue again on the grounds that important questions of the law were involved and the matter was of great public importance.

They requested the court to constitute a larger bench to decide the matter since the provisions were proving to be a hurdle in the democratic process and implementation of the fundamental rights guaranteed under the Constitution.“Besides, these provisions have also not been endorsed by parliament and since it has been put in the sixth schedule, therefore no legislation could be made by parliament without the consent of the president,” they said.