ISLAMABAD: The detained Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Senator Azam Swati on Monday expressed “no-confidence” in the bench of Justice Amir Farooq, the chief justice of Islamabad High Court (IHC), and requested him to transfer his bail plea to some other judge of IHC.
In a hand written letter to IHC chief justice, a copy of which is available with Business Recorder, he said that he has been confined in a judicial lockup in a “false case”.
Referring to his petition, which was rejected by Justice Farooq, he said: “justice delayed is justice denied’”.
He said that this was a “paramount phrase” which was required due to the chief justice’s late order which resulted in his (Swati’s) transfer from Islamabad.
“I was abducted and was illegally taken from Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) on December 2, where I was admitted, to Quetta then to Sindh and where 46 false FIRs were registered against me,” he lamented.
In the same breath, the PTI leader continued that IHC chief justice has given verdict about a tweet which his lawyers presented to Special Court Judge Raja Asif Mehmood who was “transferred immediately for reason unknown to all of us,” after which a new judge was appointed following several days of delay, who dismissed his bail application “without going into merit and without considering any legal basis and ground”.
The senator asserted that the special court judge should not have been transferred without the consultation of the IHC chief justice.
“I know it was done without legal or procedural basis for reason not known to us,” he regretted.
Swati maintained that he has “factual and legal basis to believe that I do not expect justice from your court due to bias based on ‘Asif Zardari case’ in which Supreme Court so well said that if a reasonable man would say that that the judge was biased and bias may be caused by a judgement, order or observation of superior court, bias would vitiate the confidence”.
He concluded that he has “no confidence” of getting justice from Justice Farooq’s court and requested his bail application be transferred “to any other judge of the IHC”, which he claimed was in the interest of justice and for the protection of his legal and constitution fundamental rights.
This letter comes hours after the IHC issued notices to the State on the senator’s post-arrest bail application.
Babar Awan appeared before the court on behalf of Azam Swati who had been arrested in a case of controversial tweets against the recently pensioned army chief Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa (retd).
Chief Justice Amir Farooq heard the plea.
The Federation, FIA Cybercrime and officer Anisur Rehman had been made respondents to the petition. Rehman had filed the complaint against Swati on behalf of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) cybercrime wing.
The petition stated that Swati did not post the alleged tweets and that he had no intention to defame any state institution.
The plea further stated that even after the completion of the investigation, the prosecution has no evidence against Azam Swati.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2022
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