“If we go 60 or 70 years, we will find the orders of the Privy Council hardly consisted of 10 to 15 pages. But unfortunately, here a culture has developed to compete with each other by writing judgments that run into over 1,000 pages, merely for self-projection,” regretted the chief justice.

“If God Almighty has bestowed upon you the power of pen, it should be used to dispense justice within the confines of the issues raised in the case only,” the CJP went on to say.

The chief justice was heading a three-judge Supreme Court bench, which had taken up an appeal instituted by National Assembly Speaker Ayaz Sadiq against PTI chief Imran Khan, challenging the Aug 22, 2015, imposition of a cost by the election tribunal over irregularities committed during the 2013 general elections in NA-122.

SC asks ECP whether it should pay costs for irregularities committed by election staff

The court, however, issued notice to the ECP secretary to answer whether the costs imposed by the election tribunal should be paid by the candidate or the commission, because the irregularities, if committed during the election process, were done by election staff.

In his judgment, Judge Kazim Ali Malik of the Lahore election tribunal had held that the election machinery completely and miserably failed to comply with the provisions of the Representation of the People Act (RoPA) 1976 while conducting the 2013 elections in NA-122 (Lahore).

In its order, the tribunal had also stated that the bad state of the election record provided a basis to conclude that the result of the election, whereby Ayaz Sadiq had defeated the runner-up by 8,945 votes, had been materially affected.

As a consequence, the tribunal declared the election void and ordered ECP to hold a by-election in the constituency. In the end, the tribunal had also imposed a cost by accepting the election plea.

Shahid Hamid, who represented Ayaz Sadiq, told the court that though his client had been subsequently re-elected in an Oct 2015 by-election, he had approached the apex court to remove the stigma attached to him since the tribunal had slapped the cost on him.

Why should his client pay the amount if irregularities were committed by ECP staff, the counsel argued, adding that the tribunal had condemned unheard any number of officers and staff of ECP for different irregularities without notice to the staff concerned.

Moreover, the tribunal had failed to appreciate that any deviation from the election process should and could not have any penal consequences for the returned candidate, or call into question the validity of the election as a whole, the counsel said.

The chief justice also observed during the proceedings that nowhere did the tribunal mention that Mr Sadiq had to pay the penalty.

The counsel, however, argued that since the election petition was filed against him, therefore he was supposed to pay it.

Justice Umar Atta Bandial, a member of the bench, also recalled that most of the election disputes were being decided on the basis of verification of thumb impressions conducted by Nadra.

The judge said that ECP had informed the court during one of the hearings that each by-election cost ECP between Rs150 million to 200m, adding that the cost had to be borne by the state.

While citing recent NA-154 Lodhran by-election, the judge recalled that both the winning as well as the losing candidates never raised the question of cost after the elections.