Islamabad High Court (IHC) has decided to indict former Prime Minister of Pakistan Imran Khan in contempt of court. In a written reply to IHC, Imran Khan expressed regret over the words spoken about Judge Ms. Zeba Chaudhry and said “these words came out of my mouth unintentionally. I didn’t intend to threaten the lady judge, even I can’t think of doing it”. But Islamabad High Court declared his submission unsatisfactory and decided to indict him on September 22.
Previously Chairman Pakistan Tehreek e Insaf (PTI) Imran Khan submitted a written statement to the Joint Investigation Team (JIT) in the case of threatening a female judge. In his reply, Imran Khan said that whatever he uttered in the speech does not fall under the category of terrorism, he did not do anything illegal, and did not harm anyone, “I am innocent, and the case against me should be dismissed”.
A week earlier, on September 7, in the case of threatening Additional Sessions Judge Zeba Chaudhry, the Islamabad High Court stopped the police from submitting a challan of this case to the anti-terrorism court and ordered Imran Khan to be part of the investigation. Imran Khan’s lawyer Barrister Salman Safdar said that the police added new provisions in the terrorism case against Imran Khan. Chief Justice IHC, Justice Athar Minullah inquired whether the police submitted a challan against Imran Khan or not. On this, Advocate General Islamabad said that the investigation regarding the Imran Khan case is not being conducted as Islamabad police is not being given access to Imran Khan.
The Chief Justice said that the policeman in uniform is the symbol of the state, and even if the police made a mistake, the court will decide on it. “If we do not follow the law, how can anyone else be forced to follow it, this is also a test case for the investigating officer. The law will take its own pathway, everyone should have faith in the system, if there is a false allegation, then the investigating officer should eliminate it in his investigation”, Chief Justice IHC said in his remarks.
Imran Khan’s lawyer Hamid Khan took the stand that the supplementary reply was submitted in court yesterday (September 06), and the answer is formulated on the basis of the court’s observations at the previous hearing. “We have attached two judgments of the Supreme Court of Pakistan (SCP) along with the reply and we want the contempt case to be closed now”, Hamid Khal pleaded to IHC.
Chief Justice Athar Minullah said in his remarks that Imran Khan has committed criminal insult, we have read your reply; decisions of the Supreme Court are binding on us, the aim was to highlight three decisions of the Supreme Court (He was referring to Mr. Talal Chaudhry, Mr. Danyal Aziz and Mr. Nihal Hashmi contempt of court cases in SCP).
Chief Justice Islamabad High Court remarked, “Criticize the court, we will not take contempt of court action for scandalizing, but criminal contempt of court has a very serious matter. We are defenders of freedom of expression but provocation cannot be allowed”.
Hamid Khan said that we assure the court that there was no threat in the speech of Imran Khan against the judge, on this, the Chief Justice remarked that if you want, we can replay that video of Imran Khan’s public speech again to check whether he used any threatening word or not.
Justice Babar Sattar in a conversation with Hamid Khan said that the accusation made against a female judge or the words said in public by the former PM are justified.?
In the opinion of the judicial assistant, Chief Justice IHC Athar Minullah said, “the answer of Imran Khan is not what we were hoping for; from the response, it seems that Imran Khan does not realize the seriousness of his word”.
The third assistant of the court, and Pakistan Bar Council (PBC) representative Akhtar Hussain Khan, while giving his arguments, said that the issuance of show cause notice to Imran Khan was a correct decision. Imran Khan did not apologize unconditionally, if there was an unconditional apology, I would have said stop this case.
In the previous hearing, the Islamabad High Court ordered Imran Khan to submit his reply by September 8, in the contempt of court case regarding the statement made by him while addressing a public rally in Islamabad on August 20, 2022, about a female judge. In the reply submitted by Imran Khan on September 7, it was said that he regretted the words spoken unintentionally, the statement was not intended to hurt the female judge.
A five-member bench comprising Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani, Justice Mian Gul Hasan Aurangzeb, Justice Tariq Mehmood Jahangiri, and Justice Babar Sattar headed by Chief Justice Islamabad High Court (IHC) Justice Athar Minullah, gave a unanimous verdict on the indictment after the hearing. In a written order, it said that “Defendant, Attorney General, and Judicial Assistants were heard and apprised the reply submitted by counsel, which was an explanation of the speech that led to the initiation of the contempt proceedings, so former prime minister Imran Khan will be indicted on September 22”.
In response to the Islamabad High Court’s decision to indict Imran Khan in the contempt of court case, his lawyer Babar Awan said that one decision will be made inside the court and while the other will be outside the court, he was referring to countrywide protests by PTI workers.
In an informal conversation with media men, Imran Khan said that he wanted to clarify something, everything has a context but he was not given a chance to speak. Ex-PM claimed that the government is trying to arrest him for too long, if he is arrested he will become more dangerous by going to jail. While criticizing the current government of Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N), Imran Khan said, “Imported government and its handlers are frustrated, these people are working on minus one formula, they want to replace me, but people of Pakistan will not accept it”.
Independent political analysts believe that the current political situation in Pakistan is already unbalanced and deranged if wise decisions are not made there are chances of severe dents in the political and democratic system of the country.
On the other hand, followers of Ex-Premier Imran Khan are aggressive that if he is arrested and sent behind the bar, there is a probability of nationwide protests which could convert into violent demonstrations.
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