By Special Correspondent
ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court will shortly take up Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chief Imran Khan’s appeal against the August 3 Islamabad High Court (IHC) order of remanding the Toshakhana case to Additional Sessions Judge (ASJ) Humayun Dilawar who convicted the former PM for three years.
The three-member bench of the top court headed by Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Umar Ata Bandial and consisting of Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhel and Justice Sayyed Mazahar Ali Akbar Naqvi will hear the case.
Advocate Khawaja Haris Ahmed will plead Imran’s case as he would request the apex court to suspend the proceedings before the trial court hearing the Toshakhana case. The appeal said that Justice Aamer Farooq of the Islamabad High Court, while remanding the case to the trial judge, misconstrued the submission to remand the case to any judge other than Humayun Dilawar.
“Moreover, the high court also erred in law while remanding the case regarding challenge to the jurisdiction of ASJ to proceed with the complaint on merits for the decision afresh on the grounds that the decisions earlier rendered by the trial court was ‘cursory and shoddy’ since it did not address the essential arguments of the petitioner’s counsel,” the appeal argued.
It added: “The manner in which the high court passed the judgement was in breach of the fundamental rights of the petitioner since the record showed the high court order was not passed with due application of the mind.
The Toshakhana case filed by the PDM government is based on a criminal complaint filed by the ECP.
The case alleges that Imran had “deliberately concealed” details of the gifts he retained from the Toshaskhana — a repository where presents handed to government officials from foreign officials are kept — during his time as the PM and proceeds from their reported sales.
