ISLAMABAD    -     The Islamabad High Court (IHC) has constituted a larger bench to hear a petition seeking disqualification of former premier Imran Khan as a law­maker for ‘concealing’ his alleged daughter in his nomination papers. A three-member larger bench of IHC headed by IHC Chief Justice Aamer Fa­rooq and comprising Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani and Justice Arbab Mu­hammad Tahir will hear the petition on February 9 (Thursday). 

Earlier, a single bench of IHC com­prising Chief Justice Aamer Farooq had decided to form a larger bench to hear the petition of a citizen Mu­hammad Sajid, seeking disqualifi­cation of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chairman Imran Khan.

On the last hearing, Justice Aam­er noted that Imran had stated in his reply that he ceased to be a mem­ber of the parliament; therefore, the court could not proceed against him. The Khan’s lawyer said that the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) itself had also de-notified Im­ran. The IHC chief justice said that it would be appropriate that the new situation regarding Imran Khan is determined. He added that the affi­davit that has been referred to in the plea was submitted in 2018. 

The PTI chief Imran Khan’s law­yer reiterated that the ECP had de-notified his client after he re­signed from the national assem­bly seat. He prayed the court to ad­journ the case till March as there was no need to show haste in this particular case. Imran’s lawyer Sal­man Abuzar Niazi said that they re­spect the honourable judge and they had just presented some informa­tion. Later, the IHC bench deferred the hearing till February 9 for fur­ther proceedings in this matter.

In this matter, the petitioner is seeking disqualification of the PTI chief, an MNA from the constituen­cy NA-95 Mianwali-I. He contended that all candidates contesting elec­tions for either national or provin­cial assemblies are required to fur­nish an affidavit with respect of their credentials and assets. 

He said that one such information is about the children who are depen­dent on a candidate, and in this con­nection, Imran had wrongly men­tioned two children Qasim Khan and Sulaiman Khan, and he had deliber­ately omitted the third one. 

He claimed, “The respondent no 1[Imran Khan] has deliberately and wilfully failed to declare his daugh­ter Tyrian White in the relevant col­umns of the nomination papers and the affidavit appended therewith, hence he is not sagacious, righteous, honest and a man of good character in terms of Article 62 of the Constitu­tion.” The petitioner urged the court to summon the former prime min­ister Imran Khan and inquire about the reasons for the violation of Arti­cle 62 of the Constitution, which says, “A person shall not be qualified to be elected or chosen as a member of Ma­jlis-e-Shoora (Parliament) unless — he is sagacious, righteous, non-prof­ligate, honest and ameen, there being no declaration to the contrary by a court of law”. He also prayed to the court to question Imran for “submit­ting a false declaration and affidavit and as to why he should be allowed to be a member of the parliament, and may not be de-seated in all accu­mulated consequences for the viola­tion of the Constitution and the law.”