By News Desk
ISLAMABAD: Justice Babar Sattar of the Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Friday dismissed a petition filed by the Intelligence Bureau (IB) seeking withdrawal of its objection on the bench hearing the audio leaks case.
The IB filed the withdrawal plea just days after the court had fined three other government departments for filing their objection on the same bench.
Earlier this week, Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (Pemra), Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) and Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) were slapped with a fine of Rs500,000 each for their objection plea seeking Justice Sattar’s recusal in the aforementioned case.
During the last hearing, the IB was not fined but the court had summoned its Joint Director General Tariq Mehmood for Friday’s hearing of the case.The audio leak case, which involves former chief justice Saqib Nisar’s son and Bushra Bibi — wife of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) founder Imran Khan, is being heard by Justice Sattar after the matter surfaced in 2023.
Assistant attorney general (AAG) informed the court that the IB wanted to withdraw its plea raising an objection over Justice Sattar in the bench.
“Your objection petition has already been dismissed. If the dismissal order for the application comes, you will receive it,” said Justice Sattar.
The judge hinted at issuing contempt of court notice to DG IB in light of the notice in the court’s dismissal order. “The order also asked who had given the authority to file the petition,” said the IHC judge, informing the AAG that he will be able to respond only after the order was issued. All the applicants — IB, FIA, Pemra and PTA — in their pleas had argued that the petitions of Bushra Bibi and former chief justice’ son Najamul Saqib should be placed before the bench that had decided an identical matter in 2021, requesting recusal of Justice Sattar to avoid any differing decision.
The departments had sought Justice Sattar’s recusal after a letter by six IHC judges, which also includes him, was sent to the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC), complaining about the alleged interference of intelligence agencies in the court’s affairs.
The judges, on March 25, demanded for convening a judicial convention to consider the matter of alleged interference of intelligence operatives in the judicial functions or “intimidation” of judges in a manner that undermined the independence of the judiciary.–News Desk