Justice Isa’s wife seeks initiation of contempt proceedings against Chaudhry

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court has been urged to initiate contempt proceeding against Federal Minister for Science and Technology Chaudhry Fawad Hussain for tweeting against Justice Qazi Faez Isa, wherein, he has described him as an “under trial judge”.

Sarina Isa, the wife of the apex court judge, on Monday filed a contempt of court petition under Article 204 of the Constitution read with Order XXVII of the Supreme Court Rules, 1980.

Fawad on 19-03-21 has tweeted that he has been hearing an “under trial judge” for the last one week, and that “Justice Faez Isa’s godfather [is] Iftikhar Chaudhry (ex-CJP), and if Justice Faez is fond of politics, he should resign and contest elections to ascertain his popularity.”

He then sarcastically dedicated a poem to Justice Faez Isa in his tweet.

Sarina Isa submitted that, for the record, her husband did not personally know former Chief Justice of Pakistan Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, when he was called upon to serve the country.

He left a thriving legal practice overnight by severing all his connections with his law firm, which he and a colleague had set up.

Fawad has betrayed his oath of office, betrayed the noble profession of law, and committed contempt of this court, she added.

She also stated: “He should also know that even if my husband were to accept his challenge, the law does not permit my husband to contest elections for a certain period. The federal minister by his said tweet confirmed that secret cameras have been installed in the courtroom because he was hearing all that happened in the Courtroom, despite that he has not been present in a single hearing.

“The minister was getting secretly filmed and broadcasted for his and his government’s viewing court proceedings, but when my husband and I requested that our cases be publicly broadcast his government opposed our request”.

“My husband remains a judge of the Supreme Court and is not an under trial prisoner.

Fawad as a lawyer should know this. In referring to Justice Isa as an ‘under trial judge’, he has committed contempt of this Court and of a sitting judge of this Court. His categorisation of a former chief justice of Pakistan [Iftikhar Chaudhry] as ‘godfather’, a term which is also used for criminal syndicates and mafia bosses, is highly offensive to the dignity and respect of this Court and constitutes gross contempt of the apex court.

“Fawad has violated his ministerial oath of office, the Constitution, mocked and ridiculed the former CJP, a sitting judge of the Supreme Court and committed contempt of Court.

This Court has already held that another senior government spokesman has committed contempt.

“However, as no action has been taken against that person and it appears that the Court reticence has encouraged and emboldened others to follow that abhorrent example.

“If the judges of the apex court are humiliated, disrespected and abused in this manner by a federal minister, then the ‘Twitter brigade’ at their command and the combatants of the 5th Generation warfare could do much worse.

“It appears that the one-sided abuse and threats hurled against my husband, my children and me, for the last two years, has not placated. The government supporters suggest that my husband helped Nawaz Sharif and Ishaq Dar in the Hudaibiya Paper Mills case. My husband does not know both.

The only time my husband met with Nawaz Sharif was at the President House on the oath taking ceremony of the chief justice of Pakistan, where other judges of the SC were also present with their wives”.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2021