Judiciary will collapse if Benches begin monitoring each other: Justice Isa

ISLAMABAD: The two-member bench hearing journalist harassment case was not intimated ahead of constituting a five-member bench to monitor the adjudication, Supreme Court Justice Qazi Faez Isa wrote a letter raising concerns that monitoring amongst benches would doom the justice system, ARY News reported Wednesday.

Justice Isa wrote to the apex court after the five-member bench was constituted to provide clarity in respect of invocation of the court’s suo motu jurisdiction. He said the bench continuing the hearing on the journalist harassment case taken up originally by the two-member bench was a violation of the Constitution.

He said the bench hearing the case was in violation of the Constitution after it restrained implementation of the decision of the two-member bench he headed over the journalist harassment case.

“No jurisdiction is conferred which permits one Bench to monitor the working of another Bench, let alone holding its orders in abeyance,” Justice Isa wrote.

The Constitution does not permit monitoring jurisdiction and “my distinguished colleagues do not have the jurisidiction to hear the said case (SMC No.4/2021)”.

He said it would be a transgression of the Constitution if they continued hearing it.

If an SC Bench starts monitoring the workings and orders passed by another Bench it would result in chaos and collapse of the judicial system, he said.

Justice Isa’s letter suggests divides within top judiciary, AGP tells top court

In response to the letter today, the five-member Supreme Court bench hearing the grounds and authority of the suo moto cases, in the backdrop of Justice Qazi Faez Isa’s cognizance of journalists’ harassment matter, concurs the impression that this larger bench is monitoring adjudication of another bench or is in parallel to oversee the judgment is wrong.

The bench headed by the Acting (CJP) Justice Umar Atta Bandial noted the present five-member bench is not set up in parallel to the two-member bench whose implementation was retrained earlier this month.

He said it in response to the concern raised by the Attorney General of Pakistan (AGP) who said today that the schism-like situation had emerged in 1997 when the apex court benches turned against each other.