For the time being at least, the Supreme Court verdict on holding elections in Punjab on May 14 is being followed — in as far as the Election Commission of Pakistan goes. The ECP has in an emergency meeting held on Wednesday announced a revision of its election schedule for Punjab, and given the SC-mandated May 14 as the date for polling. While this procedural step is notified, nothing in the political crisis in the country has any signs of abating. Where the PTI is celebrating the judgment, the coalition government has not just rejected the decision but is also busy preparing and passing parliamentary resolutions against the three-member bench decision. In all this, what is most glaring is that we may well have been spared much of all this had the apex court’s ‘process’ not invited this much controversy. An already polarized society now stands even more divided on matters of constitution, judicial process, and reforms.
As Supreme Court judges have consistently pointed out in the past, dissent is part of the justice system — and as such also reflects the beauty of the courts. But the fine line between dissenting judgments and a completely divided superior court is unfortunately playing out for all to see. And we have politicians from all sides working the divide to their own benefit. Where there are invocations of April 4 and the ‘murder of justice’, there are also celebrations of the SC defeating the doctrine of necessity. All of it and none of it may be true but for now justice itself stands in the crosshairs of an extremely ugly fight that started more than five years back and has continued to get uglier by the day.
It may then be all the more reason to advocate for long-lasting judicial reforms that ensure that the judicial branch sticks to its constitutionally mandated role. The Supreme Court Practice and Procedure Bill, 2023 is seen as one step in that direction and there is still waning hope that this is realized by those who are painting it — without justification — as a ploy to take away powers from the Supreme Court. In reality, the law is trying to set right some of the more common courtly controversies we have had to face recently. And indeed the apex court is in need of stepping out of the unnecessary attention it has been placed in by self-serving political factions. But all is not well, when even fellow judges of the superior judiciary are openly being critical of issues like bench formation and perceptions of partiality — one side of the apx court seen as favouring one party and the other another. Given the highly volatile political atmosphere, and the needless controversy following the courts, this perception could have been done away with had a full court bench been formed to hear these constitutional cases. The Punjab election issue is even traced by legal experts right back to the SC’s reinterpretation of Article 63A which changed the political dynamics in the Punjab Assembly altogether. The question now is: how can justice survive if its credibility is in question? It is for this reason that the judiciary too may need to come up with a way to reach out to each other and resolve its internal crisis. After all, it is not for nothing that the collective wisdom of the Supreme Court judges — through a full court — has been thought of as the best way into a consensus. May collective wisdom trump individualism so that the superior judiciary can be rightfully seen as the final and impartial arbiter of justice in the land.