Rawalpindi - The Lahore High Court (LHC) Rawalpindi bench on Tuesday sought reply within four weeks from the speaker National Assembly in response to a writ petition filed by Dr Arslan Iftikhar, son of former CJP Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, challenging the delay in acceptance of resignations of Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf’s MPs, especially of Imran Khan, by the speaker office.
Justice Mazhar Iqbal Siddhu issued notices to Speaker NA Sardar Ayaz Sadiq and ordered him to submit his comments within four weeks.
In his writ petition filed through Mubin-ud-Din Qazi Advocate, Dr Arslan Iftikhar made speaker of the NA Sardar Ayaz Sadiq, PTI Chairman Imran Khan, Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) and secretary cabinet division as respondents.
Arslan in his writ petition apprised the LHC that he was a registered voter in Quetta. He said he was eligible to contest election for the seat of member national assembly from any constituency including NA-56, Rawalpindi. He added that PTI Chief Imran Khan contested the general elections 2013 from NA-56 and won. Later, he along with his 29 MNAs resigned from the NA on August 22, 2014 by tabling their resignations. He said that Khan evacuated the seat of NA-56 and left the people in lurch.
Arsalan mentioned in his petition that due to submission of resignation, a valuable constitutional and legal right has been created in favour of the petitioner as well to contest the election from NA-56. The petitioner added, “A large number of residents of NA-56 approached him and requested him to contest election from their constituency and highlight their problems on the floor of NA.”
He said that he was making his mind to file a reference before the NA Speaker Sardar Ayaz Sadiq for disqualification of PTI Chief Imran Khan but owing to resignation by Imran, he could not exercise his legal and constitutional right.
He added that despite passage of almost two months, the speaker was not further processing resignation submitted by the PTI chief whereas under section 64 of the Constitution he had no mandate to cause delay in referring it to ECP for de-notification. The speaker has failed to perform his constitutional and legal obligation.