ISLAMABAD:
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chief Imran Khan moved the apex court against the Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Wednesday, levelling serious allegations of “deep and settled bias” on the high court’s chief justice.
The former prime minister in the petition alleged that he is being held in Attock jail after being “convicted on a cooked up and fabricated charge after a ‘trial’ in gross abuse of due process” for which he primarily blamed IHC Chief Justice (CJ IHC) Aamer Farooq.
“More than sufficient incontrovertible evidence is available to establish the deep and settled bias of the CJ IHC towards the petitioner,” the application read, accusing him of “endeavouring to do everything to keep the petitioner behind bars with the intent that he be unable to contest the forthcoming general elections and thus be ousted from the politics of Pakistan.”
Imran, in his petition, also accused Additional Sessions Judge Humayun Dilawar of “despising” him as well as claimed that CJ Farooq had “instrumented” the local judge “to advance their common objective”.
“In fact, the hon’ble CJ IHC handsomely rewarded the learned ASJ after their common project had been achieved through the petitioner’s aforesaid illegal conviction,” he alleged.
The petition also hinted at reservations against Judge Dilawar’s verdict in the Toshakhana (gift repository) case whereby Imran was sentenced to three years in jail.
Read Toshakhana: IHC seeks arguments on Imran’s plea on Thursday
However, it primarily highlighted how “the learned CJ IHC has demonstrated his bias and prejudice against the petitioner” across cases.
Here the petition mentioned the delay in the announcement of the court’s verdict in the infidelity case against Imran Khan as well as the CJ IHC’s “deliberate refrain from restraining the bludgeoning” of the petitioner during his arrest by rangers on court premises.
“He (CJ IHC) enabled the disturbing images to be seen across the country. Later he held that the petitioner’s arrest was lawful and in a lawful manner. The Hon’ble SC [Supreme Court] found otherwise. But there are too many people including the petitioner with the settled belief that the entire episode was acted as per the script of which the learned CJ IHC was a major protagonist. How can the Petitioner expect any justice from him?”
Imran, therefore, requested the SC to “transfer all cases, investigation, inquires, trials, in which the petitioner is a party/respondent/accused from the IHC to the Lahore High Court or Peshawar High Court” and “in the meantime: restrain the IHC to continue with the aforesaid trails/proceedings” and provide him with relief.
It may be noted here that the PTI chief had previously also expressed a lack of confidence in the bench of judges hearing the Toshakhana (gift repository) case, which included CJ IHC. He had requested that the chief justice recuse himself from hearing the high-profile case and transfer it to another court.
Source link: https://tribune.com.pk/story/2432142/pti-chief-accuses-ihc-cj-of-deep-settled-bias