KARACHI: The Sindh government on Saturday filed an appeal in the Supreme Court against Sindh High Court (SHC) verdict that declared as illegal the fresh delimitations before the upcoming local government polls in the province.
Advocate General (AG) Sindh, Khalid Jawed Khan filed the petition on behalf of the provincial government in the apex court’s Karachi registry, questioning SHC judgment of December 26, 2013.
He said the SHC had no lawful authority or jurisdiction to pass order regarding the local government elections which were scheduled for Jan 18 in terms of the order passed by the Supreme Court.
The AG said that with the SHC judgment, fate of the local government elections was put into disarray. He said the Sindh government, which was keen to proceed with the elections, was now completely helpless because of self contradictory order of the SHC division bench.
Khan said that delimitations of the constituencies were carried out lawfully by the Sindh government.
He argued that if delimitation is carried out by the provinces on the basis of old census blocks, the existing electoral rolls which are based on new census blocks will become incompatible with the new delimitation and the same will have to be prepared afresh for the local government polls.
The AG pointed out that proposal of the SHC division bench to constitute independent commission for delimitation exercise was unnecessary and uncalled for as delimitation is an executive function.
Without naming Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), he said that some parties were opposing ‘urbanisation’ so as to gain personal electoral benefits.
The SHC has set aside hundreds of those delimitations which were done to the complete satisfaction of the residents and the candidates and the judgment of bench is liable to be set aside on this ground alone and elections may be allowed to be held accordingly, he contested.
