ISLAMABAD, May 18: The appointment of 29 ad hoc judges of its subordinate judiciary put the Islamabad High Court (IHC) in an odd situation that led the court to cancel the interviews of 375 candidates here on Friday.

As the selection committee comprising IHC Justice Riaz Ahmed Khan and Justice Mohammad Anwar Khan Kasi started interviews of 290 shortlisted candidates for 20 vacant posts of civil judges and 85 candidates for 9 vacant posts of additional judges, Justice Mohammad Azim Khan Afridi took up the petitions of around 150 lawyers who challenged the selection criteria and shortlisting of the candidates for the ad hoc appointments.

Petitioner Mohammad Waqas Malik, a candidate who was not shortlisted, pointed out that a daughter of Justice Afridi has also been shortlisted; therefore, he could not hear the case and requested him to transfer the matter to any other bench.

Justice Afridi explained that he did not ask any of the members of the selection committee for giving undue favour to his daughter. “In fact, she is an independent entity, otherwise, I would stop her from appearing for the post of civil judge,” the honourable justice remarked.

The lawyers then raised slogans against the selection committee after which Justice Afridi referred the matter to the other court.

The IHC registrar office, later, placed the matter before Justice Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui who accepted the petitions of the lawyers and allowed about 1,500 lawyers to participate in the selection process.

He directed the IHC registrar to issue the interview call letters to all the lawyers who applied for the vacant positions and asked them to file another petition if they wanted to challenge the appointment of the relative of an incumbent judge.

The petitioners requested that the IHC administration at this juncture may not be allowed to relax the rules/criteria and a uniform policy should be adopted for determining the eligibility of all the candidates.

The IHC registrar, after the orders issued by Justice Siddiqui, cancelled the interviews of shortlisted candidates which resulted in unrest among them and they also chanted slogans against the IHC administration.