PESHAWAR: A single-member Peshawar High Court bench on Monday summoned former woman MPA Meraj Humayun Khan for responding to a petition of Prime Minister Imran Khan seeking the consolidation of two pending defamation suits filed against him by her and another former woman MPA, Fauzia Bibi.

Chief Justice Qaiser Rashid Khan fixed Feb 22 for the next hearing into the petition wherein the premier minister also requested the court to transfer Ms Fauzia’s lawsuit from a Peshawar court to a Swabi court, which is hearing Ms Meraj’s case.

Both the former lawmakers have filed lawsuits against Mr Imran for publicly accusing them of selling votes in the 2018 Senate elections.

Ms Fauzia was elected an MPA on one of the seats reserved for women in the 2013 elections on the PTI ticket, while Ms Meraj was elected on the ticket of the Qaumi Watan Party but joined the PTI in Mar 2018.

High court fixes next hearing into petition for Feb 22

Deputy attorney general Mohammad Habib Qureshi appeared for the petitioner and said the court hearing the case of Ms Fauzia had ordered ex parte proceedings against Mr Imran on Feb 13 for not being properly assisted.

He said the premier had submitted an application to the trial court insisting as the case transfer petition was pending with the high court, hearing into the lawsuit should be adjourned.

Mr Qureshi said Mr Imran had requested the court in that application to grant him time to file reply to the lawsuit.

He requested the court to issue a stay order against proceedings by the trial court until the transfer petition is decided.

The chief justice observed that the high court won’t stop the trial court from proceedings as doing so was the latter’s domain.

Lawyer Syed Ghufranullah Shah appeared for Ms Fauzia and contended that the trial court had ordered ex parte proceedings against the premier as his counsel had not been appearing before it and was using different tactics to prolong the trial.

He argued that the cases of Ms Fauzia and Meraj Humayun were of different nature, so they couldn’t be consolidated.

Ms Fauzia told the bench that she was a cancer patient and had regularly been visiting the trial court for over two years but the trial was still under way due to the delaying tactics of Mr Imran. She requested the court not to transfer her case from the current court. The bench observed that it would decide the issue after hearing all parties.

As Ms Meraj did not turn up, the bench issued another notice to her for appearance on Feb 22.

PM’S APPLICATION: Prime Minister Imran Khan on Monday moved Peshawar’s additional district and sessions judge Abdul Majid seeking the cancellation of his order to begin ex parte proceedings against him in the defamation suit filed by Fauzia Bibi and allow him to contest the lawsuit on merit.

His application was filed by deputy attorney general Habib Qureshi insisting the premier has properly been represented by his counsel in the case and that his lawyer couldn’t appear before it on the last hearing as he had to travel to Karachi for the medical treatment of his wife.

He said the non-appearance of the counsel on the previous hearing wasn’t willful.

The application said the court had wrongly assumed that neither the defendant (Mr Imran) nor his pleader ever appeared before it in the case.

It added that the defendant was fully interested and ready to defend the false lawsuit right from day one and therefore, the ex parte proceeding order was liable to be recalled.

The applications said the lawsuit should be heard by providing opportunity to the defendant to defend himself.

The court will hear the application on Feb 20.

Published in Dawn, February 16th, 2021