Business Recorder
ISLAMABAD: The Lahore Bar Association (LBA) approached the Supreme Court of Pakistan against the transfer of three judges of the Islamabad High Court (IHC) to provincial high courts in light of the 27th Constitutional Amendment. A day ago, the Ministry of Law and Justice notified the transfer of IHC judges – Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kiyani to Lahore High Court, Justice Babar Sattar to Peshawar High Court, and Justice Saman Rafat Imtiaz to Sindh High Court. The LBA President, Irfan Hayat Bajwa, on Thursday filed a constitutional petition, seeking a declaration that the recent transfer of three judges from the IHC to other high courts is unconstitutional and of no legal effect. It also requested the apex court to declare the omission and repeal of Article 184(3) of the Constitution — an inherent jurisdiction of the SC for the enforcement of fundamental rights but now repealed — through the 27th Amendment as void, unconstitutional, and of no effect, being against the basic/salient features of the Constitution. The petitioner further sought a declaration that the now-inserted Article 175(2) — as amended by the 27thAmendment — was void and unconstitutional, and that its formation was also unconstitutional, as it was against the constitutional fundamentals, which the parliament had no power to change or amend. He pleaded that in the absence of any substantive and disclosed reasons, criteria, or demonstrable institutional necessity, the transfers of IHC judges are unlawful and liable to be declared arbitrary, mala fide in law, and based on extraneous considerations. The petitioner contended that the transfers had been made without any disclosed reasons, criteria, or demonstrable public interest, thereby rendering the exercise of power arbitrary, opaque, and liable to be set aside. He argued that the Constitution does not contemplate an unstructured or ad hoc exercise of transfer powers; rather, in the present scenario involving multiple transfers, there was a pressing need for a structured, periodic, and across-the-board rotation policy, based on uniform and transparent criteria through law or subordinate legislation, which is conspicuously absent, the petition prayed further. It was also argued that the purported 27th Amendment omitted Article 184(3), under which the SC has original jurisdiction to enforce the Constitution and fundamental rights of the people, and that the judicial power of the SC could not be taken away by another branch of the government, ie, the parliament. Such an amendment undermines the Constitution and destroys the independence of the judiciary, the petition contended. The petition maintained that the SC, being an indivisible judicial institution at the apex, its powers and jurisdiction cannot be taken away. It added that the independence of the judiciary and its necessary parts/concomitants were the appointments, transfers, and removal of judges of the superior courts, which form part of the basic features of the Constitution, which were unamendable. The petition said that Article 200, having been amended by the parliament, lacked the constituent power as it lacked the mandate and the authority to pass an amendment that destroyed the judicial branch of the government, making it a subservient institution to the executive, which is the biggest violator of people’s rights and mandate. The petition emphasized that the FCC judges, being the beneficiaries and judges in their own cause, and also the creation and its jurisdiction having been challenged through this petition, cannot hear and decide the constitutionality of the 27th Amendment and matters arising thereunder. Copyright Business Recorder, 2026
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