Didn't summon PM in pilots fake degrees case: CJP

KARACHI: Two days after the Supreme Court’s summoning the heads of airlines, including Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, made headlines, Chief Justice of Pakistan Mian Saqib Nisar clarified on Saturday that the court didn’t summon the premier. 

The clarification came during the hearing of a case concerning allegations of fake degrees held by pilots at the apex court’s Karachi registry.

The chief justice, who was heading a three-judge bench, remarked that PM Abbasi was a political person and political leaders’ breaking news are flashed on the screens of TV channels. “We didn’t summon Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi,” he said.

He made these remarks when the head of a private airline brought to his knowledge the news of the premier reportedly summoned by the apex court.

The bench, meanwhile, expressed extreme displeasure over failure of the authorities concerned to have the degrees of pilots verified.

It imposed a fine of Rs50,000 on a private airline, Air Blue, over failure to comply with court orders and warned that its head will have to face action over non-compliance of its orders.

To a query, Junaid Khan, the managing director of the airline, told the judges that the airline has employed 251 people, including 101 pilots.

 A bizarre coincidence:

May 12, 2007 is also infamous as ‘Black Saturday riots’ in the history of Karachi when the then suspended chief justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry arrived at the Jinnah International Airport. Around 43 people died as a result of violent clashes between pro-government activists and supporters of former chief justice.

However, today, after 11 years since 12 May incident, we witness the revival of peaceful days in Karachi as the incumbent Chief Justice of Pakistan reached Karachi, coincidentally, on the same date to hear the cases of public concern amid a harmonious environment.