In a legal win for Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), the Supreme Court of Pakistan overturned a previous decision that denied reserved seats to the PTI-backed Sunni Ittehad Council.
Justice Mansoor Ali Shah delivered the majority verdict, 8-5, favouring the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC), an ally of PTI. The ruling nullified the Peshawar High Court’s earlier decision that had supported the Election Commission of Pakistan’s (ECP) denial of the reserved seats to SIC.
The Supreme Court declared that the ECP’s allocation of reserved seats to the ruling coalition was unconstitutional. The court upheld SIC’s petition, confirming the party’s eligibility for reserved seats and recognized PTI as a legitimate political entity. The court instructed the Imran Khan-led PTI to submit its list of candidates for the reserved seats to the ECP within 15 days.
The verdict clarified that authorities should not classify PTI candidates as independents or representatives of any other party, correcting the ECP’s earlier misclassification of PTI members as independents.
Implications of the Verdict
The verdict came after the court closed its hearing on Tuesday, having considered a series of appeals by the SIC. The full bench, led by CJP Isa and Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah, among others, delivered the decision.
In related developments, the ECP had distributed reserved seats for women and minorities across other political parties in various assemblies.
The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly allocated seats to Jamiat Ulema-Islam Pakistan, Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), and Pakistan People’s Party (PPP). In the Sindh Assembly, seats for women went to Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) and PPP, with PPP’s Samita Afzal and MQM-P’s Fouzia Hameed elected. PPP’s Sadhu Mal alias Surinder Valasai also secured a minority seat in the Sindh Assembly.
In contrast, the Sunni Ittehad Council contested three minority seats that the Election Commission allocated to PML-N, PPP, and JUI-F. Neelam Meghwar from PML-N, Ramesh Kumar from PPP, and James Iqbal from JUI-F secured the election for these minority seats.
