ISLAMABAD: Taking exception to the response of a joint secretary of the interior ministry, the chief justice of Islamabad High Court on Wednesday rejected a report on digital media outages and summoned the interior secretary along with documentary evidence providing the ground for disruption of social media app, X, formerly known as Twitter, in Pakistan.

IHC Chief Justice Aamer Farooq, who was hearing a petition seeking the restoration of the social networking app, summoned the interior secretary on April 17.

Access to X has been disrupted in Pakistan since February 17, when former Rawalpindi commissioner Liaquat Chattha accused the chief election commissioner and chief justice of Pakistan of being involved in alleged rigging the 2024 general elections.

“Elections have concluded. Let’s finish this now. Let the interior secretary come, then we will see. If the secretary is unable [to give reasons], then I will summon the prime minister,” the chief justice warned.

Earlier, the joint secretary of the interior ministry appeared before the court and submitted a report stating that X was disrupted on the basis of reports by intelligence agencies that the contents being uploaded was a ‘threat to national security’.

While terming the report ‘unsatisfactory’, Justice Farooq asked the official to produce documentation to substantiate the information provided in the report.

He remarked, “There is malice in every institution. What can I say?”

“Whatever the threats are, give detailed reasons and evidence,” the IHC CJ said, adding that a report based on speculations should not be submitted.

The joint secretary urged the court to give “one more chance”, a Dawn.com report added.

The court then summoned the interior ministry secretary at the next hearing on April 17 and directed him to produce evidence on the threat to national security.

The petition was filed by Ehtisham Abbasi, a resident of Islamabad, and named the information ministry and the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) as the respondents in the case.

It urged the high court to issue directives to the respondents to “immediately lift the ban on X (Twitter) access in the interest of justice”.

It argued that the “act of the respondents against journalists particularly in the recent past is highly violative” of Article 19 of the Constitution (freedom of speech).

Referring to the “very important fundamental right” as provided under Article 14 of the Constitution (inviolability of dignity of man, etc), the plea said that the “liberty of a person” was a “pivotal right and falls squarely within the ambit of right to life and dignity of a person”.

The petition asserted that the “impugned inaction of the respondents is deliberate, arbitrary, mala fide, without lawful authority” and “derogatory” to the provisions of the Constitution and the fundamental rights guaranteed therein.

It added that the “impugned inaction is patently void, ab initio, a contrived an untenable, misplaced, misdirected, unfounded, erroneous, contrary to the law and facts on the record”, and was liable to be set aside by the IHC.

The petitioner further argued that the disruption of X “suffers from serious legal infirmities as the same is not sustainable in view of the settled law” and that “a number of other constitutional and statutory rights have been infringed and circumvented”.

Published in Dawn, April 4th, 2024