Pak body approves Bill to raise number of judges in SC to 25

A Pakistan parliamentary panel has approved a controversial bill to increase the number of judges in the Supreme Court from 17 to 25 despite its disapproval by the opposition lawmakers who termed it an attempt to manipulate the judiciary.

‘The Supreme Court (Number of Judges) (Amendment) Act 2024’ which sought to increase the number of judges from 17 to 25 was moved in the Senate last month by independent senator Abdul Qadir to deal with the rising number of “pending cases”.

It was then referred to the Senate Standing Committee on Justice, which met on Friday and its meeting was chaired by Senator Farooq H Naek of the Pakistan Peoples Party. The committee approved a bill proposing an increase in the number of judges in the Supreme Court (SC) from 17 to 25 despite opposition from the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam.

After the committee’s approval, the bill would be presented to the Senate for discussion. The bill aims to address the issue of delay in cases.

About 60,000 cases are pending in the apex court. However, the opposition alleges that the government would pack the court with the choicest judges to influence cases about leaders of PTI. After the bill was moved last month, PTI leader Ali Zafar said that the government should have introduced reforms in the lower judiciary instead of talking about increasing the number of judges in the SC.

“This is called court-stacking,” he said, adding that several and Asian countries in the past had increased the number of judges similarly.