Explainer: How top court’s ruling impacts PTI’s reserved seats

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Islamabad: The Supreme Court has restored 77 reserved seats in the National Assembly and the provincial assemblies of Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Sindh.

The decision came when the court’s constitutional bench accepted a series of reviews, challenging its first decision to allocate specific seats of the Pakistan Tehreek -e -Insaf (PTI).

In a major change, the Supreme Court terminated its previous decision and retained the decision given by the Peshawar High Court.

Overall, 22 specific seats are in the National Assembly – 19 for women and 19 for minorities. In the Punjab Assembly, 27 seats have been restored – 24 for women and 24 for minorities.

The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly sees the restoration of 25 seats – 21 for 21 women and 4 for minorities – while 3 seats are restored in Sindh Assembly – 2 for women and 1 for minorities.

After the verdict, the Election Commission of Pakistan will issue a new information to reflect the allocation of the revised seats.

Safe seats Saga

In the February 8 elections, more than 80 PTI -backed candidates emerged after more than 80 independent candidates from PTI -backed independent candidates, and then joined the SIC to claim specific seats for minorities and women.

The SIC then contacted the ECP on February 21 to allocate secure seats. However, after the electoral body, PTI was shocked, citing failure to present a list of party candidates, refusing to allocate the SIC on March 4 through its 4-1 majority decision.

In the decision, the ECP said it extended the deadline for presenting a priority list for women’s specific seats, and before the February 8 elections, the SIC did not submit the desired list, which was “compulsory”.

Article 51 (6) has been cited in the decision of the electoral body, stating that the article clearly states that these specific seats will be allocated to the political parties who contested the elections and won the general seats based on the “proportional representation system”.

Rejecting the SIC’s request, the ECP accepted the requests of the opposition parties and decided that the seats in the National Assembly would not remain vacant and that the political parties would be allocated through a proportional representation process on the basis of the winning seats of the political parties.

The SIC cannot claim “non -actable and legal defects and violations of the constitutional provisions,” the electoral agency said.

The party then contacted the PHC on March 6, who upheld the decision of the electoral institution on the issue in the March 14 decision.

Subsequently, on April 2, the SIC tried to separate the SC’s PHC decision and the distribution of 67 women and 11 minority seats in the assemblies.

The allocation of safe seats is important because PTI -backed independent candidates, who form most of the opposition benches, lost more than 77 specific seats in the NA and the provincial assemblies due to the PHC decision.

It should be noted that the PHC decision has been allowed to allocate the allocation of seats allotted by the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) and others, which is why they are gaining a two-thirds majority in the National Assembly.

In the National Assembly, 14 seats were allocated to the PML -N and five and three additional seats were given to the PPP and the Jamiat Ulema -e -Fazal (Joy F) respectively.

The move brought the number of PML -N to 123 and PPP to 73, while PTI -backed SIC number 82.

In the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly, Joy-F was given 10 seats, the PML-N was allocated seven, while the Awami National Party got a specific seat.

In Punjab, the PML -N got 23, the PPP got two, while the Asm Pakistan Party (IPP) and the Pakistan Muslim League Quaid (PML -Q) got a specific seat.

Meanwhile, in the Sindh Assembly, two more seats were allotted to the PPP and the Muthaida National Movement of Pakistan respectively.

A three -member SC bench comprising Justice Mansoor, Justice Mannillah and Justice Mazhar requested the SIC on June 6 and suspended the ECP’s decision on the PHC decision as well.

Following the decision to suspend the SC ECP order, the coalition lost its two -thirds majority in the Lower House.

A 13-member full court bench formed on May 31 raised the matter and held nine hearings on this important issue. The first hearing is being held on June 3.

However, both the federal government and the electoral institution opposed the SIC’s request.

After submitting his court in court through Pakistan’s Attorney General (AGP) Mansoor Usman Awan, the government rejected the SIC’s request from the Supreme Court to emphasize that specific seats for minorities and women could be given to a political party and there was at least one seat on the basis of at least one seat.

Meanwhile, the ECP also adopted a similar argument in which it was claimed that the party was not eligible to get safe seats because it did not submit a list of candidates before the last date of January 24.

In addition, the PML -N also presented its written arguments before the court that the SIC is not entitled to safe seats as it did not contest in the February 8 elections or provided a list of candidates.

It also argued that the party did not win a single seat, which was necessary to qualify for allocation of specific seats according to a written offer.

He said, “No member of the SIC contested for safe seats has filed his nomination papers, leaving them with the need to enter the list,” he added, because since the nomination papers were never filed, it was never tested and no one was contested.