KARACHI, Aug 27: A division bench of the Sindh High Court has dismissed petitions in limine, through which delimitations of constituencies and other irregularities had been challenged.

The bench, comprising of Justice Zahid Kurban Alavi and Justice Ghulam Rabbani, passed the order after hearing Abrar Hasan, Munir-ur-Rehman, Mohammad Yousuf Lashari, Syed Mureed Ali Shah in person, Mr Rasheed A. Razvi and Mir Hazar Khan Bijarani in person on behalf of the petitioners and Mohammad Sarwar Khan, AAG., Ata-ur-Rehman, AC Election and Mr Saif-ur-Rehman Iqbal, DC Election, for the respondents.

The main contention of all the learned representing the petitioners was that the final notification no. F 10(116)/2002-Cord. dated June 28, regarding the delimitation of constituencies was issued in violation of section 9 of the Delimitation of Constituencies Act, 1974.

All the counsel’s put forth various arguments in assailing the impugned order, but by and large they all cantered their line of arguments on section 9 of the Delimitation of Constituencies Act, 1974.

Section 9 of the Act, 1974, runs thus:-

9. Principles of delimitation. — (1) All constituencies shall, as far as practicable, be delimited having regard to the distribution of population in geographically compact areas, existing boundaries of administrative units, facilities of communication and public convenience and other cognate factors to ensure homogeneity in the creation of constituencies:

“Provided that for the purpose of delimiting the constituencies for the general seats for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, two or more separated areas may be grouped into one constituency.

(2) As far as may be, the constituencies for election to the same assembly shall be equal among themselves in population.”

According to the counsel, essential ingredients of section 9 have to be followed — without which the constituency cannot be delimited. Primarily, amongst the several ingredients is the maintenance of administrative units. Counsel had urged that this had not been done in their areas.

On the other hand, counsel appearing on behalf of the respondents had insisted that administrative units have been maintained, but after the increase in the number of seats, portions of areas previously belonging to other units had to be taken so as to create new units within which the electorate could elect a candidate.

In the order authored by Justice Zahid Kurban Alavi, it was observed that in order to appreciate whether the commissioner had gone through all the essentials before passing the order challenged before the bench, a deeper appreciation of the fact whether the breakup of the existing units was proper or not, or had it been done keeping in mind the rules and law was required.

“We cannot go into the same at this stage. The order challenged clearly states that section 9 has been taken into consideration while passing the order. We would hesitate at this stage to challenge that statement, as the commissioner must be fully aware of the ingredients of the section and its implication.

“The points raised are speculative and factual, and we cannot entertain the same at this stage. Accordingly, we would dismiss these petitions in limine. The CMAs pending in the referred petitions have become infructous in view of the above order,” the court held.