By NNN-PTI
Islamabad : Pakistan’s Supreme Court has constituted a larger bench of four judges to hear deposed Premier Nawaz Sharif’s petition seeking an end to his exile as well as other cases next week.
Chief Justice Iftikhar M. Chaudhry formed the larger bench yesterday to take up the petitions by Sharif and his brother Shahbaz to permit them to return to the Islamic nation and other cases, according to media reports.
The petitions challenging the Sharifs’ exile were filed by their lawyers and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) last month. The petitions stated it’s a fundamental right of the two brothers to return to their country to take part in the general elections slated for later this year.
On August nine, the Supreme Court had issued notices to the federal and provincial governments in connection with the petitions of the Sharif brothers.
Apart from the Chief Justice, the bench consists of Justices Javed Iqbal, Faqir M. Khokhar and M Javed Buttar. It may be mentioned that Chaudhry had earlier objected to Iqbal taking over as the Acting Chief Justice soon after his suspension on March nine.
The four-member bench will also continue the hearing of the petition filed by former Prime Minister and Pakistan People’s Party Chairperson Benazir Bhutto on August 16 about the non-registration of over 22 million eligible voters in the country.
The Chief Justice also constituted other benches for hearing different cases in Lahore and Karachi. Justice Rana Bhagwandas has been included in one of the benches.