19/09/2025
Islamabad High Court Judges File Petitions Against Their Own Chief Justice For Misuse Of Power
In an extraordinary development at the Supreme Court of Pakistan, five judges of the Islamabad High Court Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani, Justice Tariq Mehmood Jehangiri, Justice Babar Sattar, Justice Sardar Ejaz Ishaq Khan, and Justice Saman Rafat Imtiaz marched together towards Supreme Court and submitted separate petitions against their own Chief Justice, Sarfraz Dogar, accusing him of misuse of authority.
In their petitions, the judges moved the SC to declare that administrative powers could not be “deployed to undermine or trump the judicial powers” of the high court judges.
They further asked the apex court to declare that a chief justice of the high court was “not authorised to constitute benches or transfer cases” once a high court bench had been assigned a case.
Moreover, the petitions sought the declaration that the chief justice of a high court “cannot exclude available judges from the roster, at will, and use the power to issue a roster to oust judges from performing judicial functions”.
The SC was also urged to declare “that the constitution of benches, transfer of cases and issuance of roster can only be done in accordance with the rules adopted by the entirety of the High Court under Article 202 (rules of procedure), read with Article 192(1) (constitution of high court) of the Constitution”.
The petitioners also asked the apex court to declare that the “decision-making” with respect to the constitution of benches, issuance of roster and transfer of cases could not “solely rest in the hands of the chief justice”.
Source: Dawn Today
