Parliament enacted legislation with ‘good intentions’, says Chief Justice Isa

The Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP), Qazi Faez Isa, while hearing petitions filed against the Practice and Procedure Act (2023), remarked that the Parliament has enacted the legislation with good intentions. “If a patient is dying, can a person with medical understanding allow the patient to die just because he is not a doctor? Parliament is told that the number game should be complete, but one person comes and makes Parliament a rubber stamp,” he said.

A full court headed by CJP Qazi Faez Isa is hearing petitions against the Practice and Procedure Act (2023) in the Supreme Court.

During the hearing, Justice Ijaz-ul-Ahsan remarked that Parliament cannot make rules or legislate to make rules; only the Supreme Court has the authority to change the rules within the scope of the existing law.

The CJP said that the Constitution says that the Supreme Court is authorised to make its own rules of practice and procedure.

Justice Ijaz-ul-Ahsan said that the Constitution already binds the Supreme Court to make rules in accordance with the Constitution and the law, while the Chief Justice of Pakistan, while talking to the president of the Supreme Court Bar Association, Abid Zubairi, said that time is short, asking what difference does it make to the option.

Abid Zubairi said in his arguments that even if the words of making rules according to the constitution and law are removed from the constitution, it will not make a difference, to which CJP Isa said that it is fine; the answer has come.

Abid Zubairi said that when the Supreme Court made the rules, they could not be changed by law, and the CJP said that the hearing has to be completed today, as he wanted to hear the lawyers.