Daily Times

Reacting to the proposal of appointing ad hoc judges at the apex court, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan on Tuesday said “the move is aimed at PTI’s reserved seats judgment and its standing as a party”. “The move to appoint ad-hoc judges and that too four judges at once and during vacation, is uncalled-for and is unprecedented,” PTI Chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan stated expressing suspicion about the proposal, in a post on X (formerly Twitter). The PTI chairman argued that not a single ad hoc judge had been appointed in the apex court since 2015. “It was decided in principle that ‘adhocism’ is prejudicial to the ‘independent judiciary,” Gohar said. Dissenting from the JCP’s argument regarding easing the SC’s workload, the PTI leader said that the appointment of four ad hoc judges would not reduce the case burden. Instead, he stressed that these appointments would compromise the entire Supreme Court and its judges. “There is also a genuine apprehension that the move is aimed at PTI reserved seats judgment and its standing as a party,” he argued. “In view of the huge number of pending cases and the ever-increasing trend of the institution of cases in the SC, an effective way to ensure that more cases are decided than instituted and to reduce, and hopefully eliminate the cases, which are pending adjudication for several years, it would be appropriate to appoint experienced judges as ad hoc judges of the SC,” said the JCP notification.