ISLAMABAD: The legal status of the parliamentary committee, which has been formed to decide terms of reference (ToRs) for the judicial commission on the Panama leaks, has been challenged in the Islamabad High Court (IHC). According to details, petitioner Shahid Orakzai has submitted a petition in the IHC in this regard. He has raised several questions about the committee in his petition. One such question is, “Can the National Assembly speaker form a joint parliamentary committee according to the constitution?” He says that under rule 22 clause 1 the number of members of any joint committee cannot be more than 10. The deputy chairman of the Senate and deputy speaker of the National Assembly have not been included in the parliamentary committee. The petitioner has asked the IHC to direct National Assembly Speaker Sardar Ayaz Sadiq to immediately stop the parliamentary committee from working. The petitioner has made Sadiq a party in his petition. It is worth mentioning here that Sadiq notified a 12-member parliamentary committee to decide the ToRs for the judicial commission on the Panama leaks this week. The commission would investigate Panama Papers’ reports on offshore wealth of Pakistani politicians, including members of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s family. The commission would also look into the allegations that some people got their huge loans written off and others transferred their ill-gotten money abroad illegally. The parliamentary committee has been given two weeks to decide the ToRs.