ISLAMABAD, June 6: The Supreme Court on Friday refused to issue an order restraining Mian Shahbaz Sharif from taking oath as chief minister of Punjab, but decided to serve notices on the federal government, Election Commission, Mr Sharif and returning officer for the PP-48 Bhakkar II constituency.

A two-member SC bench comprising Justice Mohammad Moosa K. Leghari and Justice Mohammad Farrukh Mahmud took up a petition of Syed Khurram Shah, a voter, seeking suspension of Election Commission’s notification declaring Mr Sharif a successful candidate.

The apex court will resume the hearing on Monday.

The Election Commission had on Sunday declared PML-N leaders Nawaz Sharif and Shahbaz Sharif qualified to contest the by-elections. Shahbaz Sharif was elected unopposed on June 2 after three other candidates withdrew from the contest.

“He (Shahbaz Sharif) is not competent to sit and represent the people of his constituency because he is a defaulter and accused of maligning both the judiciary and the armed forces through his statements contrary to provisions of the Constitution and the Representation of the Peoples Act, 1976,” Advocate Ahmad Raza Khan Qasuri, legal counsel for the petitioner, told Dawn.

“We are not burdening the apex court to go into the merit of the case as the main petition is pending before the high court, rather seeking suspension of the ECP notification,” Mr Qasuri said.

In his petition moved under Article 185 of the Constitution, the petitioner argued that the operation of the order of the returning officer and the ECP notification be kept in abeyance and the respondent (Shahbaz Sharif) be restrained from taking oath as a member of the Punjab assembly or from participating in the proceedings of the assembly in any manner.“The disqualification of Shahbaz Sharif is of the pre-election period and, therefore, continues to be in the field,” he pleaded.

The LHC is seized with two separate petitions — one by Khurram Shah who has challenged the candidature of Shahbaz Sharif from PP-48, Bhakkar, and the other by Noor Elahi, an independent candidate from NA-123, who has filed a petition against Nawaz Sharif.

The petitions were filed after an ECP tribunal handed down a split verdict on appeals challenging the candidature of the Sharif brothers.

Justice Hafiz Tariq Nasim allowed the Sharifs to contest the by-polls while Justice Mohammad Akram Qureshi held them ineligible.