ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader Fawad Chaudhry on Friday criticised Peshawar High Court (PHC) after it suspended Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa provincial cabinet’s decision to initiate legal action against Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) leadership for allegedly speaking against the armed forces and instigating the masses.

Shortly after a division bench of the PHC suspended the provincial cabinet’s decision of registering cases against PDM leadership, Chaudhry took to Twitter and said: “In this country, the judges are the law. The judges are not under the law rather the law is under the judges”.

“The judicial system of the country is facing such a huge division which is reflected in today’s decision of Islamabad High Court (IHC) which considered statement against state institutions such a serious issue that it completely ignored serious charge of custodial torture and handed over Shahbaz Gill to the police again,” he tweeted.

On the other hand, he regretted that “in the eyes of a division bench of Peshawar High Court (PHC), the decision of the [provincial] government to file cases against PDM leadership on same charges was nothing but rubbish and it’s reflected in PHC’s orders which suspended cabinet’s decision without even issuing a notice to the government”.

The statement from the PTI leader comes after a division bench of PHC suspended the notification of the provincial cabinet of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa regarding registration of cases against PDM leadership for hate speech against state institutions.

The KP provincial government’s notification for the empowerment of a government official in Dera Ismail Khan district to register cases against PDM leaders on charge of spreading hate against state institutions was challenged in PHC.

The provincial cabinet was of the view that it was unfortunate that Nawaz Sharif, Asif Ali Zardari, Maulana Fazlur Rehman, Rana Sanaullah, and Capt Safdar Awan (retired) had been making public statements, using foul language, hurling baseless accusations, calling names and ascribing filth against the military establishment including Chief of Army Staff (COAS) Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa with impunity.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2022