ISLAMABAD, April 28: The Supreme Court on Thursday adjourned for a week the review petition of the All Pakistan Newspapers Society (APNS) challenging the Seven Wage Board Award for newspaper employees. The petition was to be heard by a three-member bench comprising Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, Justice Rana Bhagwandas and Justice Falak Sher. But the hearing was adjourned since the bench was incomplete owing to the absence of one of its member, Justice Falak Sher. The case would be taken up on May 5.

At the outset, APNS counsel Abdul Hafeez Pirzada said that the case had taken a new turn with the filing of a petition before the Supreme Court by some journalists.

He said that the journalists who had filed the petition through advocate Akram Sheikh, had challenged the jurisdiction of the Sindh High Court (SHC) to hear the wage award issue on the grounds that the same had already been discussed on merit by the apex court.

Mr Pirzada said that though these journalists were not a party before the SHC, they had challenged the high court’s jurisdiction despite the fact that the apex court had dismissed the APNS petition on technical grounds, without going into merits.

Moved by 25 petitioners, the APNS review petition was moved against an earlier Supreme Court judgment which through a unanimous order had dismissed its petition against the award.

The APNS filed the review petition with the contention that certain errors of law in the order of dismissal of their petition justified a review of the earlier judgement.