Pak SC pushes for contempt of court case against Malik

Islamabad, Jan.26: In a sou-motu action, the Pakistan Supreme Court has summoned attorney general to appear before it on February 18 and initiate a contempt of court case against Interior Minister Rehman Malik for meddling in judiciary's affairs.

"Have we ever intervened in executive's matters or parliament," Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry said while warning Malik to stop interfering in the apex court's working.

Chaudhry described the issue as a 'classic case' of executive's interference in judiciary's affairs.

It is pertinent to mention here that the court had taken serious note of Malik's interference in a case concerning the Pakistan Steel Mills (PSM), which suffered a whopping loss of 22 billion rupees.

Malik admitted that he had committed a mistake, but not deliberately, and said that the size of corruption in PSM surpassed 20 billion rupees and no audit had been done for five years.

Meanwhile, a local court in Peshawar granted pre-arrest bail to Malik in a case in which he was charged for leaving the country through an unauthorised route despite his name featuring in the Exit Control List (ECL).

Malik's counsel argued that the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) had filed the case against the minister on the request of former senator Saifur Rehman in order to take 'revenge' from him. (ANI)