While talking to journalist Abdul Qayyum Siddiqui on Thursday, Iqbal said that the judges seldom spoke during the arguments of Imtiaz Siddiqui, the counsel for one of the petitioners.
According to him, it seemed that the judges had been briefed that won't be any observations and that is why Siddiqui spoke uninterrupted for about 40 minutes.
Iqbal said two to three junior judges seemed uneasy with their facial expressions and body language.
Earlier today, the apex court suspended a parliamentary bill seeking to clip the suo motu powers of the Chief Justice, till a final verdict is issued in the case.
The bench, led by Chief Justice of Pakistan Bandial, and comprising Justices Ijaz-ul-Ahsan, Munib Akhtar, Sayyed Mazahar Ali Akbar Naqvi, Muhammad Ali Mazhar, Ayesha Malik, Syed Hasan Azhar Rizvi, and Shahid Waheed took up the Supreme Court (Practice and Procedure) Bill, 2023.
“Prima facie the contentions raised disclose that there is a substantial, immediate and direct interference with the independence of the judiciary in the form of multiple intrusions, in the guise of regulating
the practice and procedure of this Court and conferring upon it a jurisdiction that appears not to be permissible under any constitutional provision,” the order read.
The top court said, 'The moment that the Bill receives the assent of the President or (as the case may be) it is deemed that such assent has been given, then from that very moment onwards and till further orders, the Act that comes into being shall not have, take or be given any effect nor be acted upon in any manner.'
The Pakistan Bar Council has boycotted court proceedings and the ruling coalition rejected the bench and termed it ‘controversial’.