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Deadlock over PoK judge to end amicably?
Chairman of the Parliamentary Mediation Committee, Raja Muhammad Nasim Khan, has expressed hope that misunderstandings between the Muslim Conference, the main political party, and the government would end soon.
There are hopes that the ongoing judicial crisis in Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir, called Azad Kashmir (AJK) by Pakistan, will be resolved soon with politicians warning that India “can take advantage of the situation.”
Chairman of the Parliamentary Mediation Committee, Raja Muhammad Nasim Khan, has expressed hope that misunderstandings between the Muslim Conference, the main political party, and the government would end soon.
Stressing the need to solve the problem, he said: “This is not a matter of who wins or lose…The main objective is to solve the problem amicably.”
Khan said that the region could not afford to sustain such a crisis at a time when India was beefing up military presence along the Line of Control, adding that incidents of Indian soldiers firing along the ceasefire line had also increased significantly.
At present, AJK has two Judges both claiming that they are the correctly appointed Chief Justice (CJ) of AJK.
The acting CJ Manzoorul Hasan of Azad Kashmir’s Supreme Court heard a reference this week against deposed CJ Riaz Akhtar Chaudhry in Muzaffarabad and held as unconstitutional the Supreme Judicial Council established with the deposed Chief Justice Riaz Akhtar Chaudhry as its head.
Justice Hasan said that the Judicial Council under the deposed CJ is unconstitutional and directed the government to present all evidences against the deposed CJ. Justice Hasan in his judgement, bound the government from transferring any official including chief secretaries until the hearing of the case against Justice Chaudhry was complete.
On the other hand, the Supreme Judicial Council, headed by Justice Chaudhry has ordered the acting CJ Manzoorul Hasan and High Court CJ Ghulam Mustafa Mughal to stop functioning.
