PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Friday adjourned until May 18 the hearing of a petition challenging the voting rights of lawyers in elections of various bar associations and directed the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Bar Council to place its application seeking dismissal of the petition on record.
The case was heard by a two-member bench comprising Justice Ejaz Anwar and Justice Inamullah.Counsel for the petitioners, Shumail Butt, Yasir Khattak and others, informed the court that after amendments related to outstanding dues made by the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Bar Council, thousands of lawyers had been deprived of their right to vote.
The petitioners argued that the bar council intended to hold district and tehsil bar elections on the basis of a new voters’ list. They stated that the PHC had already suspended the KP Bar Council’s notification regarding dues and voting rights, following which the bar elections were postponed.
The lawyers requested the court to declare the amendments introduced by the KP Bar Council null and void and order that elections be conducted based on the previous voters’ list.After the hearing, the court issued a written order stating that it had been informed about a miscellaneous application filed by the KP Bar Council seeking dismissal of the writ petition.
The order noted that since the application was not available on the court file, it should be placed on record. The court also directed the petitioners’ counsel to submit a reply to the miscellaneous application within two weeks.
