The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Monday accepted the unconditional apology of former Gilgit-Baltistan (GB) Chief Justice (CJ) Rana Muhammad Shamim.
Earlier, Shamim submitted an apology to the high court because of his own controversial affidavit that incriminates former Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Mian Saqib Nisar of favouring Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan.
IHC Chief Justice (CJ) Athar Minallah expressed satisfaction over the apology by Rana Shamim.
Justice Minallah remarked that the effect of Shamim’s affidavit has died down with the unconditional apology . He said that, “there is no case against him unless he backtracks from what he has stated in the apology”.
The court also exempted the former judge from personally appearing at the next hearing on September 29.
Former judge Rana Shamim apologises to court for accusing Saqib Nisar of favouring Imran Khan
Last week, Rana Muhammad Shamim submitted an unconditional apology to IHC and completely disowned a controversial affidavit associated with him.
The first unconditional apology was submitted to the Court on September 12, 2022. However, at the time he stood by his allegations against former CJP Saqib Nisar. Then again on Friday (September 16), he submitted an unconditional apology, disowning his own ‘controversial’ affidavit and withdrew from its contents.
The affidavit contained allegations that Saqib Nisar had attempted to influence a case against former Prime Minister (PM) Nawaz Sharif and his daughter, Maryam Nawaz, in an attempt to bring Imran Khan into power.
In the apology submitted on Friday, the former CJ said, “I tender an unconditional apology for an affidavit which was neither correct nor required.”
Expressing his regret over the “grave mistake”, the judge said it should never have happened.
“I place myself at the mercy of this honourable court,” he added.
He, further said that the affidavit was due to his “glaring misunderstanding and unintentional mistake”.
“Hence, I withdraw from the contents of the said affidavit. I profusely apologise for the wrong and unnecessary affidavit”, he added.
“I, while suffering through the extreme stress of loss of my close family members in such quick succession, realised the importance of writing down the incident in my knowledge as soon as possible, as per my beloved late wife’s will; therefore, I chose to do so during my transit stay in London,” he wrote.
Earlier, this month the high court fixed a contempt case against Shamim, on September 5.
