A five-member larger bench of the Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Thursday unanimously rejected the Sunni Ittehad Council’s (SIC) petitions, seeking reserved seats for the party, reported 24NewsHD TV channel.

Justice Ishtiaq Ibrahim, the bench head, read out the verdict.

Other judges on the bench were Justice Ijaz Anwar, Justice Atiq Shah, Justice Shakeel Ahmad and Justice Arshad Ali.

A couple of hours ago, the court reserved its decision in the case.

The court said that for a political party to become entitled to reserved seats, it had to first contest the general elections and win at least one seat. “Truth of the matter is that the SIC has none,” the judge said.

Barrister Ali Zafar, counsel for the PTI-SIC, argued that that was not the case. “After all, SIC exists as a political party,” he said, adding, “Out of total 226 seats, the party is entitled to 78 seats.”

The judge asked Barrister Zafar what he had to say on the argument that the PTI had weakened its case by asking its MNAs and MPAs to join the SIC.

Barrister replied that there was an option that the PTI-backed independents could join the PTI after getting elected rather than the SIC. “But there were some difficulties,” he said, “There were two reasons why we joined the SIC: the first reason was that the PTI had lost its election symbol prior to the February 8 elections. And the second reason was that the Supreme Court had refused to acknowledge that the PTI’s intra-party elections were as per the party’s constitution.”

The court said that the PTI had ample time to hold its intra-party elections. “Then why did not you hold the elections?” the judge questioned.

Barrister Zafar told the court that intra-party elections had been held. “But the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) refused to accept the poll results,” he said, adding, “The PHC gave to the PTI its symbol. But the Supreme Court later stripped the party of that.”

Reporter: Amir Shehzad