LAHORE     -    The Lahore High Court (LHC) on Fri­day set aside the acceptance of resig­nations of 72 MNAs of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) by the Nation­al Assembly Speaker and their sub­sequent de-notification by the Elec­tion Commission of Pakistan (ECP).

The court ordered the PTI MNAs to appear before the speaker for with­drawing their resignations, besides ordering the speaker to decide the resignations' matter after re-hearing the lawmakers.

The single bench comprising Justice Shahid Karim announced the ver­dict while allowing petitions filed by Riaz Fatyana, Shah Mahmood Qureshi, Shafqat Mehmood and oth­er MNAs, belonging to the extent of the Punjab province. The petition­ers had challenged acceptance of their resignations by the National Assembly speaker and subsequent action of the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP). Earlier, the court had suspended the orders of the ECP of de-notifying the PTI MNAs and stopped by-polls in the relevant constituencies.