PHC dismisses petition of minority MPA-elect

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Thursday dismissed the writ petition filed by the MPA-elect Baldev Kumar against the non-issuance of his production order from prison to take oath of his office in the assembly. A division bench comprising Justice Waqar Ahmad Seth and Justice Younas Thaheem dismissed the petition.

During hearing, Additional Advocate General Qaiser Ali Shah appeared in the case and said the KP Assembly Speaker had stated in his comments that he had not received any request from the petitioner in writing for his production order in the assembly for his oath as MPA and thus the writ petition is premature.

As per the written comments submitted by the Speaker and Secretary KP Assembly, it was stated that the petitioner had been arrested by the Buner Police in connection with the murder of Sardar Suran Singh, the PTI minority MPA, as he was the principal accused in the case. They submitted that though Baldev Kumar was placed at the second position of nominations originally made by the PTI, he was behind bars.

"Baldev Kumar has not taken oath of the assembly, therefore, he is not a member of the provincial assembly for which under Rule 65A of the Provincial Assembly Procedure and Conduct of Business Rules, 1988, production order can be issued on the written request of the member of the assembly," the Speaker stated in his reply.

He claimed that even in the instant case no written request from the petitioner or the parliamentary party leader was received by him for issuing the production order. Speaker Asad Qaiser stated that he also sought guidelines from the Election Commission of Pakistan as to how in absence of explicit provision in the rules such person could be called for taking oath in the session of the assembly so that further steps could be taken accordingly, but the Election Commission's reply is still awaited in this matter.

However, the Speaker stated that there was no explicit provision which empowered him to summon such a person to attend the sitting of the assembly. The bench had sought the reply in preliminary arguments of Mohib Jan Salarzai, lawyer for Baldev Kumar, who was arrested last year in connection with the murder of Sardar Suran Singh.

Being on Serial No 2 on the priority list of candidates submitted by the ruling PTI for seats reserved for minorities, the petitioner was declared returned candidate on the vacant seat by the Election Commission of Pakistan.

Earlier, the petitioner's lawyer had stated that his client was a PTI leader and belonged to the minority Hindu community. He said that during the 2013 general election, Sardar Suran Singh was elected MPA on the seat reserved for minorities and appointed adviser to the chief minister, but he was killed on April 22, 2016 in his native Buner. The outlawed Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan claimed responsibility for the killing, though the police maintained it had worked out the murder case and had subsequently arrested Baldev Kumar and his accomplices being the accused.